SteinsGate: Operation Fenris Deja Vu
by Yolashillinia
Summary: Rewriting the movie so Kurisu doesn't wibble about tragically so much. Come on, experiment-loving genius girl! Your not-boyfriend needs you and your smarts! Kurisu/Okabe, complete
1. Chapter 1: Kymatological Barbecue

Steins;Gate got me. But I didn't like some things about the movie so I rewrote it. Stakes are higher, Kurisu doesn't give up so very easily, some things I didn't understand get explained so they make sense to me at least, more fluff! Some dialogue stolen, some dialogue original, may get wonky in places. In this chapter, you may be wondering what I changed and the answer is: not much.

Big big thanks to chestnutchris, who went to all the trouble of writing out a complete chart of who calls whom by what honorific!

.

Chapter 1: Kymatological Barbecue

.

I braced myself nervously as the plane touched down on the runway, though there was hardly a bump this time. It still startled me and I almost yelped before I clapped my hands over my mouth.

This was silly. It wasn't as if I hadn't been to Japan before. I should be more at ease than last time I came.

But it was the first time since I'd met them. …Him.

Would he be waiting at the airport? I'd told Mayuri when I was coming, since I did want to visit with them while I was here and not just give my lectures, and I knew Mayuri told everyone at the Future Gadgets Lab everything. At the time, I'd considered the surprise of not knowing if he'd be there to be fun. Now I dreaded it, the butterflies in my stomach threatening to become dragons.

It took forever to clear customs and get my luggage, as usual, but once I entered the arrival lounge… "Kurisu-chaaaan!" Mayuri screamed, and launched herself at me. I managed to brace for impact, enough that she didn't knock me over. "Tuturu! Welome back!"

"Hello, Mayuri!" I said, looking down at her. She hadn't changed a bit, the same sparkling smile on her innocent face. "How are you? I'm so happy to see you again. Thank you for coming to meet me."

"Mayushii is doing great! Mayushii brought Ruka-kun and Daru with me, too!" she chirped, waving behind her. There were Ruka and Daru, waving a little shyly. I disentangled myself from Mayuri's hug and waved back to them as I approached. "We're all so happy to see you, Kurisu-chan!"

"H-hello, Makise-san," Ruka said softly.

"Did you have a good flight?" Daru asked, going for my luggage to carry it for me. Perhaps there was some gentleman to be cultivated in him yet.

"No shorter than usual," I answered. "Hello, Hashida, Urushibara-san. It's good to see you as well." I looked around, my heart beating uncomfortably fast, a blush threatening to break out on my cheeks. "You didn't bring…" Where Mayuri and Daru were, there _he_ was always as well.

"Okarin had to do some shopping, he said," Mayuri said. "I'm sure we'll see him later!"

"Th-that's fine!" I exclaimed. "It's not like I was expecting to see him or anything, or that he'd even want to see me after a year without emailing me." Daru muttered something that sounded like 'tsundere' to Ruka, and I glared at him as Ruka blushed.

"Okarin didn't email you since you left?" Mayuri asked, grey eyes sad and concerned.

"No, he didn't. You're the only one I managed to keep in touch with, Mayuri."

"That's kind of rude of him," Mayuri said to herself. "I know he felt shy about it, but I didn't think he would do that…"

"Shy? Okabe? Ha!" I tossed my head and folded my arms. "It's just as well, I'm sure he would have just emailed me nonsense about experiments and 'Operation Jormungandr' and 'the Organization' and whatever else is in his ridiculous head."

"Oh, we did Operation Jormungandr ages ago," Daru said. "We did that one when I first joined the lab as Member 003. Man, I haven't thought about that in ages."

"What was it?" I asked. Why was I not surprised that he'd already used that codename?

"Oh, er, something about finding a girl he'd once seen. It wasn't so easy to just search for people online even two years ago, so we didn't turn up the person he was looking for. He didn't know her name or anything, he'd just met her one day years ago and wanted to know if she was still around. But…"

"Of course he was looking for a girl," I sighed.

"Oh! That reminds me!" Mayuri cried. "Daru has a girlfriend!"

"Whaaaat!?" I exclaimed, and Daru actually blushed. "Like, a real actual human girlfriend, not some oversexualized twit from one of his games?"

"Yes, exactly!" Mayuri said. "They met on the internet. She's very pretty!"

I looked disbelievingly at them all. "P-pretty!? Did Hashida win the lottery or something?"

Mayuri put a finger to her chin, thinking. "I don't think so… Daru, you have a picture, right? Show, show!"

Daru reluctantly got out his phone. "Her name's Amane Yuki, and she's a cosplayer of some of the girls from some of those games, she likes them too. We haven't met in person yet, but…" He showed me a picture of a fun-looking young woman dressed in a costume, making a peace sign.

"Does she know what you look like?" I whispered to him.

"Er, well… I sent her this picture…" He showed me another picture, one that basically showed only his eyes.

I sighed. "Photoshop… I might have guessed. Well, don't terrify her with your pervertedness when you meet in real life, all right? She doesn't need to be scarred for life."

"Oh, she said she likes big bear-like guys, so it's okay!" Mayuri said.

"Don't assume that by 'bear-like' she means 'fat'," I scolded.

"You're so mean, Makise-shi."

.

We arrived at the lab a taxi-ride later, and the place was still messy and cluttered as I'd seen it last. Ruka got me some tea while Mayuri showed me all the little changes in the lab, including the computer where Alpaca-Man lived. Apparently he had a family now. "So cuuuute!" Mayuri cheered. I really didn't know what to make of it. Was it one of Okabe's insane experiments? Or, as I considered more likely, one of Daru's games…?

The door opened and I heard a familiar deep voice complaining. "Damn that Mr. Braun! He chose a faraway store on purpose-"

I swung around, my heart in my mouth, just as his tall, skinny figure rounded the corner of the stairs. His amber eyes latched onto mine and brightened with a shyly happy expression, and he straightened under the load of his groceries and continued forward, his gaze still fixed on mine.

My mouth was dry, and I was sure I was blushing horribly. Why did he have to look so handsome with that gentle smile and that messy black hair? Wait, was- was he blushing, too?

"Ah, Okarin! Tuturu!"

Then he unceremoniously dumped his plastic bags on the floor beside the table where Feyris was showing Ruka some kind of cute nerd thing, his smile changed from gentle to maniacal, and he struck a pose, pointing dramatically at me. His lab coat swirled around him.

And this is what came out of his mouth: "Long time no see, Assistant! No, I mean Christina. No, I mean experiment-loving perverted girl. 'Pervert' for short."

"There's a limit to rudeness!" I exploded, clenching my fists. Any more of this nonsense and I was heading straight for the hotel! How could I have expected more from this complete and utter moron?

 _He did tell you he loved you a year ago…_ my inner voice told me. I told it to leave me and never come back.

"Ha! That reaction… it seems you are the real Christina. Christina!" He walked past me and flung his arms wide in a theatrical gesture. He certainly enjoyed saying that name that wasn't mine.

"Get it right… there's no 'tina' in my name! No 'tina'!" I yelled at him.

"Christina…" he continued as if he hadn't heard me. "The Future Gadgets Lab is a secret state organization." _No, it wasn't, shut up, idiot_. "It's only proper that you have the proper authorization to get in!" _What, by having a stupid nickname!?_

"I'm a lab member too!" I protested. "You gave me that stupid badge last year, I have the right to come and go as I please!"

"Ha! You haven't shown up for a year and dare make such a wild claim? And you call yourself my assistant!"

"I'm not Christina and I'm not your assistant!" I yelled as he began to laugh maniacally. Ugh! I was going to murder him!

"By the way, experiment-loving perverted genius girl…"

"No!"

"What are you doing in Japan, perverted girl? Did you come to apologize for not showing up at the lab?"

"No, you moron! There's a conference I'm attending! And I wanted to see Mayuri too." I shook my head. "You're an annoying afterthought."

"And what's this? Tea?" He made a face at my glass on the second computer desk. "What happened to drinking the intellectual beverage of the chosen?"

"I like tea. Go get your Dr. Pepper and shut up."

"But Dr. Pepper is far superior," Hououin Kyouma drawled, prowling around me. "The perfect flavour, the perfect fizz, the perfect colour… Do you disagree, Celeb 17?"

"Shut up! That's also a stupid name. Tea is the drink of intellectuals everywhere else in the world, except your apar- lab," I said, taking a drink of my tea to prove it.

"That is the opinion of an unenlightened populace. This is why I must bring about a new world order, rife with chaos, so that all will acknowledge that I, the mad scientist Hououin Kyouma, have the best taste in drinks-!"

"Yes, yes, or just that you're stark raving bonkers," I interrupted him, sighing in exasperation. "Hello to you too, by the way, since you haven't said it yet."

Mayuri giggled. "Okarin and Kurisu-chan get along so well."

"W-what? I suppose – I just-" I stammered, flustered by the implications.

I braced myself for more accusations of hentai tendencies from Kyouma, but they didn't come. Instead, he turned away, putting his cell phone to his ear and muttering into it. "Yes. It's me. The lab has been infiltrated by Organization lies. Even the most innocent among us have been affected. What!? The will of Steins;Gate? I suppose so. I'll let you know the results. El. Psy. Kongroo."

I ignored him and turned back to the others. "Ah, I brought gifts for you, Mayuri, Urushibara-san, Feyris-san," I said as I remembered, and went for my suitcase, digging them out of the outside pocket. "I hope you like them."

"Did you bring me anything uncensored?" Daru began.

I glared at him and Okabe. "Customs would arrest me. I didn't bring anything for you two, because you're a jerk and didn't even write once," I told Okabe, who had the decency to look embarrassed. Actually I'd gotten Daru something, but I'd give it to him later. "Sorry, I didn't get you anything, Kiryuu-san. I didn't really know you last year…"

"It's fine…" she whispered, absorbed in her drink.

Okarin gave a wild evil laugh. "Don't be ridiculous! I wasn't expecting anything!" I ignored him. _He_ was the tsundere one, not me.

"Oh, it's so cute!" Mayuri exclaimed, already having opened her present, a sewing kit. "Thank you so much, Kurisu-chan!"

"You're welcome," I said. "I'm glad you like it. You have to show me the next cosplay you make with it!"

Never one to be kept down, Kyouma interrupted again smoothly. "The fact that all the lab members have been reunited here is Steins;Gate's choice. Mayuri! Prepare for the round table meeting!"

"Okay!" Mayuri chirped, but didn't move yet.

"Rukako, I didn't hear you give the password when I came in…"

"Ah, um," Ruka dithered. "El… Psy… K-kongree…?"

Even I knew that wasn't right by now. "It's El Psy Kongroo, Ruka-kun," Mayuri corrected him. "You're okay with staying for dinner, right, Kurisu-chan?"

"I… I suppose," I said. "I hadn't planned anything for dinner anyway…"

"Then no more being tsundere! You too, Okarin! I know you're happy to see each other, so just be happy, okay?" I stole a glance at Kyouma, trying to hide my own blush; he was trying to maintain the mad scientist persona, but it was looking a bit awkward now. He never could be honest about his feelings, could he? Unless completely alone and taking the initiative, of course. Good gracious…

He cleared his throat. "Ah. Um. Well. What are you all standing around for? We must prepare for Operation Aegir!" he exclaimed. "Mayuri, Rukako, Feyris! Prepare the experiment materials!"

"Yes, sir!" Mayuri and Feyris cried, saluting enthusiastically, echoed shyly by Ruka. They'd planned something, apparently, because now the two girls and the androgynous boy went straight for the groceries.

"Daru, prepare Future Gadget 024, the molecular acceleration device! Shining Finger-"

I lobbed a bottle of Dr. Pepper at his head; he managed to catch it, though it was a close thing. Shining Finger was the stupidest nickname he had, and I was glad it wasn't another of mine. "Fine, here's your Dr. Pepper, now stop grandstanding and say hello like a normal person!"

He smirked. "Don't mutiny on me, Assistant! I know these preparations excite you as well!"

"I'm just glad I know that Future Gadget 024 is a barbecue," I retorted. "Mayuri told me."

"Security breaches everywhere!" He turned to Moeka and dropped his voice into Kyouma's smug drawl again. "Will Mr. Brauuuun be joining us, with his miniature minion?"

"I… think… so…" Moeka said, pausing from where she was retrieving plates from his cupboard.

"Well, I suppose if he must… Be on your guard, everyone! Do not speak lab secrets in front of him!"

"Uh-huh," Daru said, heading towards the stairs. "Okarin, do you want me to start the grill now, or were we going to hang out a bit first?"

"Oh, uh…" Okabe shot a glance at me, looking suddenly shy. "I mean, you must be tired, from your plane flight and all…"

"No, we can start now," I said, nodding at Daru. "I'm fine with that."

"Well, then, Assistant, come with me! You can help with the most important part of this experiment!"

"Not your assistant," I repeated impatiently, but I followed him anyway. He was full of energy, bounding up the stairs two at a time, and I had to jog to keep up with him.

The 'most important part' turned out to be setting up tables and chairs on the apartment's roof, while Daru got the grill going. Moeka brought up plates and chopsticks, the bane of my culinary existence here in Japan, and after a while, Mayuri, Ruka, and Feyris brought up food to be cooked, and more drinks for all of us. After a short while, Tennouji-san and Nae-chan came up and joined us, although Tennouji-san disappeared for a short while before coming back with additional drinks.

It was a lovely evening, with good food, and good company. Daru and Feyris were teasing each other madly, Mayuri was catching me up on all the news properly, Ruka was watching Moeka who was focusing on her food, and Okabe wasn't a pain. Actually, where was he? He'd set up this whole party, and now he was- ah, brooding on the other side of the roof. What an idiot! I was going to go drag him back over-

"Oh, hey there, you need a new drink," Tennouji-san said, handing me a can. "Here you are."

"Ah, thank you," I said, and cracked it open. It tasted a little different than the one I'd had before, but I knew Okabe had been careful to get non-alcoholic beer, since he and I and most of the others were under the age of 20.

But why was my head spinning when I got up to walk over to Okabe? It turned into more of a stagger, and I hit the railing a little harder than I'd expected. He was pressing a hand to his head and I grabbed that arm to steady myself. "Ooookaaaabeeee, I'm not convinced!"

"A-about what…?"

"The time machine!" I babbled. "Theoretically- theoretically, it's impossible! Completely impossible!"

"You're really close-" He couldn't back up anymore, I had him trapped against the railing of the roof. That is, if I didn't fall over drunk.

How had I gotten drunk?

Okabe was wondering as well, because he took the can out of my hands and turned it over, looking at it. He started, and looked over at Tennouji-san, and I woozily realized that Tennouji-san had brought real beer for himself and Moeka, and had mixed up the can he gave me. But that wasn't important right now. "Hey, are you listening?"

"What are you talking about?" he asked slowly.

"Last year… I'm talking about before! What you told me when you came to America!" I said, rather loudly, but getting quieter and quieter as I got more and more embarrassed. "About another worldline, and that something happened to another me… Then you took advantage of the fact that I didn't understand and in the confusion you even- even-"

"Even what?" He stared at me with wide, frightened eyes, and suddenly jumped, flailing his arms. "Wait! Why are you bringing that up now!?"

"What, is it that shameful to you now?" I felt my face collapse in disappointment. I'd only spent the last almost-year thinking about that time we spent on a highway in the California desert! Replacing the misty, half-memories of a dreamed other-life kiss with the solid memories of reality and then clinging to them… Not only was he more of an idiot than I remembered, he was heartless, too, to have forgotten so quickly, to not know what it meant to me! Oh, I was going to cry…

He actually squeaked. "Eh!? No, I-I didn't mean-"

"It really… to me…" I wasn't sure what I felt for him, but if he didn't care for me anymore, before I'd even decided, that hurt-!

"Is everything okay?" Feyris called over to us.

"Everything's fine!" Okabe squeaked back.

Everything was not fine! "This guy! He didn't email me at all since last summer, and after- you told me you loved me in any worldline, and you even kissed me, several times, at length, and-" He was shushing me frantically, shooting terrified glances over at his friends. "And you didn't write to me at all and I was-" Even drunk, I couldn't say that I was lonely.

"Ooookaaaabeeeeeeeee-"

"Shh, shh, shh," he shushed me again. "Let's go inside and get you lying down." He began to half-lead, half-drag me towards the stairwell.

I struggled, of course. He was pushing me around again! "Give it a break!" I finally broke free from him inside the door of the stairs and pushed, and he staggered a couple of steps down the stairs.

"That's dangerous!" he stammered, recovering his balance a couple of steps down. "Ku-" He looked up at me and gulped.

I giggled. We were alone finally! Maybe he would talk to me normally now. "Okabe…"

"W-what?"

"Hold me." I fell forward into his arms, his lovely lanky arms. "Mmmm, scratchy scratchy," I mumbled, rubbing my cheek against his cheek, feeling the scraggly half-shaven beard growth there. "Scratchy scratch. Eheheheh." Standing two steps above him meant I could finally reach his face without standing on my toes. His skin was warm under the scratchiness, his hair was soft where it brushed against my forehead. He couldn't really hate me, could he? He was holding me, wasn't he? This was so nice…

"Kurisu…?" His voice was so much higher when he wasn't in Kyouma mode. And when he was panicky, it seemed. "Wh-what if someone comes in?"

"What?" I demanded, pulling my face away from his. "You don't want to be seen?" Maybe he _was_ ashamed of me. Maybe I would have to kick his butt down the stairs. If I could manage the balance and dexterity required, that is.

"Well it's not that-"

"Then it's fine, right?" I chirped sweetly.

"Well, but-"

"Yes or no!? Which is the choice of Steins;Gate!?" If I played into his delusions, would he give me a straight answer?

"Um-"

Ugh. I wasn't going to get anything out of him. Abruptly I let go of him and leaned back, and he stumbled a few steps farther down the stairs, looking up at me where I clung to the railing at the top. "Thankssss for the party, Okaaabeeee. It's goooood to see everyone!"

"Y-you're welcome," he said, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly, but smiling in relief.

"Neh, Okabe."

"Hm?"

"Catch me!"

"Uwaaahh!"


	2. Chapter 2: Relive Atrophy

Some changes here: no horrifying PTSD flashbacks/worldline jumping during the party, at least not that Kurisu witnesses (I hold that Okabe still went out to the park and howled at the heavens afterwards, but she doesn't see that), but a more direct revelation of worldline jumping, and also extra days to use later. Laundromat scene almost entirely stolen because that was one of the best parts of the movie (along with the train-station kiss).

Personally I'm pronouncing 'relive' (which I made up) as "ree*-laiv" (rhymes with 'speed-dive') but you can pronounce it how you please.

.

Chapter 2: Relive Atrophy

.

About half an hour later, I was starting to feel more like myself again. Okabe stayed with me, getting me a cool damp cloth for my head and then sitting his gangly self down near the couch where I lay, just watching me. It should have made me uncomfortable, I could have accused him of being a pervert and started another fight, but there was something about this silent togetherness that seemed… normal, somehow.

"You feeling better?" he asked.

"Yeah," I answered, trying to remember what I'd been doing when drunk. I'd hugged him, I think. That wasn't too bad. I could live that down, and if I got teased, I could always blame it on the alcohol. Was that what adults did for fun? I'd studied the effects of alcohol on the brain, but feeling it for real… It wasn't that much fun. People were strange.

"Why were you asking about the time travel again?" he asked.

Fortunately, I had an answer for this one. "I'm a scientist. I don't want to accept the idea of past life encounters, destiny, world lines… or time machines."

He smiled, as if to himself. "I know," he said very quietly.

"But even though I try to deny them in theory, something keeps bothering me… My head gets all messed up…" Sometimes my dreams felt more real than reality, and how was I to make heads or tails of that? My confused feelings for him aside, how was I supposed to deal with insane fantastical situations like evil future dystopian European research dictatorships? That just couldn't be real. But something told me it was, even though that was obviously impossible.

He shifted, and something fell from the pocket of his lab coat onto the floor. I turned to look and saw a package in gift wrap. "Hm?"

"Oh." He looked embarrassed. "Well, I lied earlier when I said I didn't get you anything." He picked it up and handed it to me, carefully _not_ watching me now.

I opened it carefully, and there was – a spoon and a fork, with the most adorable little happy faces on them. "Ah! For me? How did you know…?" I'd never told him about my father's promise, did I?

"I guess that didn't happen," he said, almost to himself, and I looked at him in concern.

"In another… another worldline, I told you I wanted a spoon and fork?" Maybe not specifically to do with the promise?

"Yeah." He seemed sad that didn't happen in real life- I mean, this timeline.

I guess it made me sad too. Some other Makise Kurisu had experienced so much more with him… I worked to remember, images and feelings floating just out of reach in the recesses of my brain… We'd struggled, fought for Steins;Gate together, and he'd been broken over and over and over again, and all I could do was watch… I was glad I couldn't remember clearly. Except for the part where he kissed me for the first time. I mean, where I kissed him for the first time, after he told me he loved me for the first time. That was… worth remembering. "Well, thank you very much. I really appreciate it."

"Yeah?" He smiled shyly at me.

"Yeah. It does feel weird, like you can spy on my thoughts, but… at least you used your knowledge for something kind, so I guess it doesn't really matter that you found out through… nefarious methods, ohohoho." I gave a weak mad-scientist laugh, and he snorted a laugh of his own. "I'm going to nap off the rest of this alcohol, okay? You can go get some dinner if you like."

"Mmkay," he said, but he didn't seem inclined to move. I closed my eyes.

There was a cautious knock at the door. "Yes?" Okabe called, and Daru opened it carefully and poked his head in, before sighing in relief and opening it all the way, carrying a pile of dirty dishes for the sink.

"Glad I didn't walk in on anything!"

"What do you mean?" I asked suspiciously, lifting my head from the Uupa pillow.

Okabe immediately began to study the Uupa carpet as if he'd never seen it before. "No, no, don't be silly, Daru."

"Like, steamy stuff," Daru said, his expression a strange mix of embarrassed and lecherous.

I shrieked at him. Good thing Okabe hadn't given me a knife.

.

I spent the next couple days getting organized for my job, gave my first lectures, and spent the evenings at the Future Gadgets Lab with Okabe, Mayuri, Daru, and whoever else happened to be around. Okabe was tinkering with some kind of air-conditioning unit he was building out of a fridge, but it didn't seem to work very well. I told him so, but my speciality was neurology, so I really couldn't help much with engineering or whatever this counted as. He just shrugged and kept working on it.

But I also noticed he seemed to be having sudden migraines, and it worried me, even though I didn't want to admit it to him. I didn't remember him having those before. Mayuri hadn't mentioned them. Was he okay? There were so many reasons why someone would get migraines, from having a genetic predisposition to them, to eating too much MSG… I looked up the causes just to be sure, and so many of them could apply to him.

We were walking home from May Queen three days after the party when he was hit by another one, grabbing his head suddenly with a gasp of pain.

"Okabe?" I asked anxiously. "Is it another migraine?"

"I…" He couldn't say much through the pain, or didn't want to, but he straightened up and tried to look normal. I knew him much too well to be fooled by such a weak cover-up, though.

"You know, migraines are often caused by a seratonin imbalance in the brain. There's a number of factors that could cause migraines, like eating too much MSG or salty foods, or not eating at all, or having your sleep cycle disturbed… Do you think it's any of those things? You're not genetically predisposed to them, are you?"

He tried to smirk down at me. "Are you _worried_ about me, Christiiiina?"

I ignored the teasing and asked the question I didn't want to ask. "It's… not to do with… _that_ , is it?"

His face closed down immediately. "With what?"

"With time travel!" I cried. "Is it to do with the things that happened a year ago?"

He wasn't looking at me, his face set and expressionless. "No."

"You're lying."

"How do you know!?"

"Because I know you, stupid! So it _is_ to do with time travel!"

He glared at me, but I stood my ground. But I had to blink-

No Okabe. Empty space before me. I gasped and took a step back, rubbing my eyes. Where had- was he doing other dangerous experiments? Was he fooling me somehow? People don't just vanish into thin air!

 _Blink_. He was back.

"Okabe!" He was clutching his head over his eye again. The pre-frontal lobe was deeply involved with short-term memories, holding thoughts in the consciousness… though that wasn't necessarily why he was holding his head there. Just experiencing something or remembering something wasn't enough to make it hurt like it looked like he was hurting… Normally, at least, I couldn't say anything to the effects of inadvertent time travel. And it wasn't even necessarily activity in that part of the brain that would cause it to hurt. Ugh, if I was a medical doctor I might be able to tell! "What was that!? What just happened!?"

Without answering, he turned away from me with a flick of his lab coat and strode off down the street with his long stride. I had to jog to catch up.

"Hey! Don't ignore me! Okabe, tell me: what did you do?"

"I don't want to talk about it," he growled, and I shut up, letting him walk away from me, watching him go anxiously.

.

Next day was laundry day. I wasn't inclined to use the hotel's overpriced services, so in the morning I put my things in a bag and headed out for the little laundromat Okabe had shown me once.

He was there. I'd maybe sort of expected it. "O-okabe…"

"Hi, Christina." But the way he said it was so tired. I decided not to call him on mangling my name again.

"Look, I'm… I'm sorry about pushing you last night."

"It's all right." The way he said it made me think he didn't want to talk about it anymore. Maybe later, then.

"What are you doing here?"

"That's my line," he said, and though he didn't have the energy to smile, apparently he had the energy to put on Kyouma. "While removing the medals known as 'dirt', acquired in the course of my research, I was recalling my accomplishments. I don't wish to be disturbed." Translation: he was brooding again.

"Too bad. This isn't your lab, and it's certainly not where you live-" which was the lab. "Scoot over and let me by. It's not like I enjoy doing laundry with you or anything."

"Gah!" He huddled up as I edged past him where he sat square in the middle of the laundromat, opening washing machines to find an empty one. "Hey, don't just open people's wash while they're not here…"

"Don't just leave your stuff in when it's done," I said, pulling the edge of a white garment out of a washer. "And you should probably get a new lab coat, this one's so worn-out even though it's just been washed…"

"Kurisu," he said, staring at me with a wry, partly-confused smile, "that's Daru's laundry."

I turned back to the garment, got a better look at it, and realized it was a giant pair of underwear. I shrieked and slammed the lid of the washing machine, diving for the hand sanitizer.

"Daru would be so sad to know you reacted that way…"

"It's underwear!" I cried. "I don't want to be touching a boy's underwear!" _Unless it was yours? No, no, no, pervert brain, betraying me!_

"I texted him about it," he continued as if I hadn't done anything. "He'll be down eventually to change it over. Mine's in the dryer over here."

"You need to stop wearing that worn-out thing!" I exclaimed, trying to cover for my colossal error. "It's no wonder I mixed them up without taking a close look!"

"A worn-out lab coat is part of the scientific aesthetic!" Kyouma protested, tugging at his lapels.

"W-well, there's a limit! You still need a new lab coat!" I exclaimed, pointing at the one he was wearing. "Look, there's a rip in the sleeve! And it's so threadbare and old and stained with Dr. Pepper and who knows what else…" I sighed. "I can at least stitch up the rip. Give it here."

Okabe's eyes widened, and he stared at me. I took a step back and blushed without knowing why. He looked…

"What!?"

"N-nothing. It's nothing." He obediently stood and pulled off the lab coat, leaving himself in a plain grey t-shirt. It looked really good on him, it wasn't too baggy or too tight, and it really showed off his shoulders well…

I blinked and blushed and hastily accepted the lab coat he was holding in my direction. "It's normal for me to having a sewing kit."

"…That's right."

"And… I… did get you something after all."

"Hm?" He looked curious.

Luckily I'd brought it, having finally worked up the nerve- I mean, forgiven him enough to slip it in my bag. I'd given Daru's present a couple days ago, but Okabe was… special. "Here you are. This is the sort of lab coat we wear in America. You should always have a spare. It should fit your height, they're all tall over there." I'd had to look hard for one that wasn't too short; I knew he liked it to be dramatic and flowy, but that was considered more of a hazard in a real lab. This one repelled liquid, though, so hopefully it would resist Dr. Pepper better than the one I was about to mend.

I didn't miss the little smile on his face as he accepted the unwrapped package, carefully unsealing the plastic and pulling on the coat. Well, he looked fantastic in a t-shirt, but there was just something about a lab coat that suited him completely. And not that there was anything too different about Japanese lab coats from American ones, but just the fact that it was crisp and new made him look good, too.

To distract myself, I pulled up another stool and found my sewing kit where it always was at the bottom of my purse. "Now, just to warn you, don't complain about the results. I might be decent at Home Ec, but it's been a while since I had to practice. And I'm out of white thread, so…"

"That's right," he said again, very quietly.

I looked up from threading the needle with the next lightest colour in my kit – pink. "What is it?"

He shook his head. "Nothing."

Quiet Okabe meant something was wrong. Not to mention vanishing Okabe or migraine-suffering Okabe. How could I help him return to his normal annoying self without hurting him further? "Is it something that happened on another worldline?"

"Yes. And yet, no." He sat, looking wistful.

I bent my head to the sewing. "What was that self-contradicting statement?"

"It's because of my Reading Steiner that I can observe other worldlines and still retain memories of them. And among those countless worldlines that continued to converge and diverge, I drifted, and miraculously reached the only one I really wanted to be on." I felt myself shiver and looked up. "On this worldline, you are sitting here with me, and Mayuri is working part-time at May Queen… That's enough for me. I can't ask for more."

So my dreams were right. He had suffered for Mayuri and me, to undo the circumstances of death and fate itself. "Okabe…" I whispered.

"I wanted the you of this worldline to get to know me normally, so maybe I've said too much. Sorry."

"W-what?" I asked, but he interrupted me.

"That's all I'm going to say. Your hand has stopped, Assistant." There was a teasing gleam in his eye, and surprisingly, I was happy to see it.

"I know! But… I… I just wonder if everything you say is true."

"It's natural to doubt the existence of worldlines…"

"It's not that," I said, my needle moving steadily now. The stitches weren't coming out very even, but they would hold the tear closed, and that was all that mattered. "If countless worldlines really exist, I find it hard to believe that you alone carry memories of them. That this Reading Steiner is something completely unique to you." Hadn't he himself told me my dreams were real?

"Do you dislike that?" He sounded curious, as if observing my answer abstractly.

"Not really," it would send everyone in the world to therapy forever, "but… for example, I'm sitting here sewing up your coat. It shouldn't be possible, but I have the strong feeling that it's happened before." He was staring at me and I laughed a little. "The term deja vu comes to mind, doesn't it? It did for me, but it happens so often when I'm with you." In California, now here, I'd only been with him a few days, really, but so much of my time with him felt like time with an old friend, even if I wasn't paying attention to the shadow memories. "Tell me, have I done this same thing in another worldline?" I showed him the hem of his sleeve, stitched together a bit messily.

He stared so long with his lips parted that I knew the answer. "I knew it."

He looked me in the eyes. "What's your point?"

I put down my needle, since I was done the sewing part anyway, and got ready to expound on something I knew about. "Deja vu is considered to be an anomaly caused by the overlapping of the short-term memory and the long-term memory. In other words, it's a phenomenon created by a temporal discrepancy of memories. Reading Steiner is the retention of memories of multiple worldlines generated by the alteration of the past." Or so I was theorizing. "Thus, both are memory anomalies created in the brain by temporal displacement. I just confirmed a different worldline occurrence based on a memory I had acknowledged as deja vu."

He turned to face me, his stool rattling as he shifted his weight. "You're saying that deja vu is a form of Reading Steiner?"

"It may be difficult to demonstrate, but it's possible." I lowered my head shyly. "I want to write a paper on it when I get back."

He bowed his head too, a little smile on his face. "No matter when you are, you never change. You experiment-loving girl!"

"I'll take that as a compliment," I told him, without any of my usual ire, cutting off the end of the thread. "After all, isn't that one of the best qualities of a good scienti-"

I looked up just as the lab coat fluttered down to drap across the empty chair. "O-Okabe! Okabe!"

I picked up the empty coat, looking around wildly as if that would bring him back. Panic sweeping over me, I stuffed the coat in my purse and sprinted in the direction of the lab.

"Mayuri! Hashida!" I exclaimed as I crashed through the door. "He- he just- we need to find him!"

"Hmm?" They were both looking at me in confusion. "Find who, Makise-shi?" Daru asked.

"Tuturu?" Mayuri said.

"Th-that guy!" Don't tell me they forgot the idiot who they spent all their spare time with! "You know, him-!" Why did I not want to say his name? "The one who founded the Future Gadgets Lab!" Wait, could I not remember his name!? He was so important to me, I couldn't have forgotten-!

Mayuri and Daru looked at each other, then Daru looked at me and pointed to himself. "That would be me, Makise-shi."

"Whaaat?" I cried. "Then whose lab coat is this!?"

Mayuri came to look at it. "Isn't it yours, Kurisu-chan?"

I looked down at it, at the tag. It was an American brand. Who else would have an American lab coat? "I… I guess you're right. What was I so worried about? Oh, by the way, Hashida, your laundry is ready to go in the dryer. You should do that right away."

"Okay, okay," Daru sighed.

That left me with one nagging thought that slipped away even as I grasped at it – if it was my lab coat, how come I had gotten a men's size medium? I was a women's size small…


	3. Chapter 3: Vetitive Liaison

Chapter 3: Vetitive Liaison

.

I was doing pretty well on my latest Japanese trip. I gave my lectures, focusing around my new thesis about dreams, and there were people there, and they asked interesting questions, questions that would help me refine my research. And of course I visited my good friends Daru and Mayuri every day, and we went about together often, or just messed around with Daru's latest inventions in the lab.

And yet… about a week after I'd come to Japan, I started feeling strange. Not physically strange, no. But I just had this feeling, a feeling I couldn't even define.

It got stronger as the days went by, eventually coalescing into a certainty that something was missing from my life. What was missing, though? I had everything I needed to bring in my luggage… my hotel room was comfortable… my lectures were going as scheduled, and I was getting paid for them properly… my friends were all where they ought to be, and I was able to spend time with them…

That last gave me pause. I had the strong feeling that I'd fought with them more in the past, the first time I'd been to Japan. But Daru was a pushover, and no one could fight with Mayuri unless they were completely heartless… and the others, Ruka, Feyris, Moeka, I didn't know well enough to fight with. Yet I was certain: I'd fought with someone, explored scientific discovery with someone, even cared very much about this someone, though I didn't want the someone to know. There was a piece of my mind sealed off, something of my memory, and even with all my studies in neurology, I didn't know how to unlock it…

"What are you thinking about, Kurisu-chan?" Mayuri asked at that moment, sitting on the couch next to me, stitching away at her latest costume.

"I'm… not sure," I said slowly, staring at my happy-face fork; I'd just eaten lunch. "Do you ever have the feeling that something is missing?"

"Hmm…" She paused and put a finger to her chin, thinking hard. "Mayushii's been having a feeling like that, yeah. Like there used to be more excitement around here?"

Excitement was one way to put it, sure. "Or you, Hashida?"

"Hm? What's that? I almost have an ID, hang on a minute."

"What are you doing?" I asked, standing to move over to his computer.

"I'm hacking into CERN!"

I blinked. "Why?"

He looked confused. "I'm… not sure. Why not? They must have all kinds of cool science secrets we can use in our Future Gadgets, right?"

"I feel like there was another reason," I mumbled to myself. "Why do you have all this Dr. Pepper in the fridge? No one here drinks it."

"Mayushii buys it!" Mayuri piped up. "But Kurisu-chan is right, Mayushii doesn't remember why."

"Someone is missing," I said, more certain than ever. "There ought to be someone here… if only I could just _think_!" I looked wildly around the lab, and my eyes fell on the perfectly ordinary microwave in the back. Microwave and Dr. Pepper…

An evil laugh… a white lab coat… nonsense words and Norse mythology… a head bowed in grief and pain… a wistful smile… a… kiss…?

"If only I could go back like a week in time…" I muttered. "I just know the answer is back there somewhere. Maybe I should go see a therapist and look into hypnosis… No! Hypnosis is bunk. Unreliable. Easily manipulated."

"But isn't time travel impossible?" Mayuri asked. "Mayushii isn't smart enough to understand it, but time just flows on without stopping or changing, doesn't it?"

"It might not be so impossible," Daru said. "You connect a phone to a microwave, and you need the 42" CRT in the shop downstairs to be on…" A funny look crossed his face. "How do I know that?"

"I know there's a theory about time travel using black holes to work," I said slowly, turning to the whiteboard to organize my thoughts. Half-remembered formulae crept from my marker, punctuated by expressive smiley faces. "Maybe that's why you're hacking into CERN? The LHC is said to create miniature black holes, after all." _Deja vu, deja vu, deja vu_.

"World…lines?" Mayuri wondered, watching me and my work. "Time leap?"

"Yes," I said hesitantly, wondering why I was so sure this would work. "I can make a headset that will transfer the information of your hippocampus, which is where your long-term memory gets processed, into data, compress that through the LHC, and send it back in time through a phone. And if I have the memories of now in my past self, I can figure out how to solve this puzzle." I stopped and stared at Daru. "This is ridiculous. I even wrote a paper on time travel-" which my father had stolen when he tried to kill me, and which then was destroyed in a plane crash "-but that doesn't mean it's easier to do than a hundred other ways to figure out what's wrong."

"None of which you're suggesting right now," Daru said. "So let's do some time travel!"

.

I blinked and brought my phone down from my ear, checking the date. My phone said 10:00 PM, August 12, 2011. That was the day I'd chosen, all right. A day close to when my memory felt funny, but before that. Wait, what had I just been doing? I was building… a thing… a device…? And Daru was hacking into… CERN? Why would he do that…?

I was standing in the middle of the street near the Future Gadgets Lab, and I continued the rest of the way there, uncertain of past or future, climbing the stairs as if in a dream, sitting down on the familiar green couch…

"What is it, Zombie?" came a deep mocking voice over to my left and I looked over to see – tall, skinny, lab coat, messy black hair, curious amber eyes, taunting smile. "Spacing out again?"

"Okabe," I said in a tiny voice. "Okabe Rintarou!"

He looked confused, then worried, then angry. "Did- You didn't just-"

"Just what?" I demanded defensively.

"You just time-leapt, didn't you!" he exclaimed, stepping forward to loom over me. "Don't you remember how dangerous that is!? Didn't I specifically say never to mess with time under any circumstances?"

I wasn't about to be loomed over and jumped to my feet from the green couch. "Well excuse me, you vanished into thin air and then no one could remember _you_ , let alone anything you said about time travel! How did you know, anyway!?"

"You walked in here as if you didn't know where you were, and then looked at me like you'd seen a ghost! I've done that enough times I can guess what it looks like!" He looked furiously upset, grabbing my shoulders tightly and shaking me until my head rolled around. "Why did you do that!? Even if you find out how, you should never, ever build a time machine!" His voice cracked, desperate, terrified.

"O-okabe!" I whimpered, panicking in fear from his anger, on the verge of tears. "You're hurting me!"

He looked horrified, and his grip loosened and fell away. "Sorry." His voice was a hoarse whisper. He collapsed on the couch, arms resting on his knees, head bowed. "Why? Why would you do it? After I've warned you not to?"

"Because you're going to disappear tomorrow!" I cried out. "You'll disappear from this worldline, and it'll write over you like you never existed! But we remember, not clearly, just enough that it's obvious something's missing – that you're missing! And I'm not going to just leave a nagging feeling like that sit around uninvestigated! And now that I know… if I don't do something, you'll disappear forever!"

"And what if you fail?" he demanded, standing again to loom over me, eyes more serious than I'd seen them in waking memory, haunted by spectres I couldn't see. "If you choose to 'do something' by altering time, and it doesn't go well?" He bowed his head. "The answer is simple. You'll do it again. You'll keep going to the past until you succeed. As long as they have the means to go back in time, that's what people will do. But it will only increase the suffering. A change in the past will always affect something else. It will never change in a way that is convenient for you. If you save someone… you will lose someone. Dreams you finally fulfilled won't exist anymore. Your long-held desires will be snatched away, eradicated. And when the change you hoped for doesn't happen, you will keep having to face that inescapable reality, again, and again, and again, and again!"

He was almost crying, and I was fixed in place, unable to reach out to him. He pulled himself back together with an effort. "Do you realize the pain of continuously repeating all that, while bearing the responsibility for all those losses? Do you understand the fear of losing your humanity while it wears you down?"

He was speaking from deeply personal experience, and it chilled me. "But-"

"Even if you have the means, the past must not be changed. You must not turn chance into reality. No one knows the future. It's because the past cannot be undone that people can accept all sorts of pain, adversity, and cruel accidents, and still move forward."

"Then what are you going to do, Okabe!?" I lunged forward and grabbed his lapels. "You're going to disappear! I saw it… I saw a world without you. A lab with only Mayuri, Hashida, and me… Where no one remembered you… It would be worse than death! Any mark or meaning of your existence will disappear! We won't even remember your name!"

He stared past me.

"I don't care."

I gasped, let go, took a step back.

"All I wanted was for Mayuri and you to live in peace and keep walking towards the future. Nothing more. It's fine as long as that comes true."

I stared, and he turned his back on me and walked out.

.

I followed him.

We walked in silence for many blocks. It was dark, and there was little to no traffic and no pedestrians.

He turned to look back at me. "How long are you going to follow me?"

I wasn't going to admit what I was up to. "I'm not. I'm going back to my hotel."

He looked left and right. "That's not in this direction."

"I have somewhere to go first," I said.

"Where?"

Calling me on my bluff? Heartless jerk. "That's my business, not yours."

He kept walking, and I kept walking in the same direction.

He came to the plaza in front of the train station, empty at this time of night. He stopped there, and I waited. Finally, he turned around.

"Kurisu."

"Yes."

"The moment I disappear tomorrow, the people around you will think I never existed, but since you leaped through time, you might remember."

"Yes…" I said quietly. "I suppose I might."

"To a small degree, Reading Steiner is present in every human." What I'd been saying about deja vu in the laundromat? But he didn't remember that, because it would happen tomorrow. Except now it wouldn't happen, because how could we just go and do our laundry and chat about dreams after tonight? "Since you've been moving through time, you may experience it more than others."

"What are you trying to say?"

"Forget."

I gasped, just a little. I thought he would say it, but to hear it so bluntly spoken…

"Forget me. Just like the others, think that I never existed. This moment was just a dream. Remembering something no one else can is a painful thing. You can't talk to anyone about it. No one will understand you. You'll be alone. So… just go on with your life."

"So that's how you've been feeling all this time?" I asked. I shouldn't have pushed him away so much! We spent so much time fighting, I had no idea how he had really felt! If only I'd reached out to him more during the year, he wouldn't have felt so alone – maybe I wouldn't have believed him easily, but I could have helped! "Then…" I bowed my head, and tears spilled from my eyes. "Then it's no good!"

"Kurisu," he whispered.

"It's no good! You have to exist!" I plunged forward until I collided with his chest. He stood silent and unmoving, his arms not coming up to hold me, letting me vent on him. "If that's what I did for you on another worldline, then do the same for me! Stay by my side! Listen to me!" I sniffled. "Suffering alone… then disappearing by yourself… That's… That's too selfish!" I screamed the last words into his chest.

Now he put his hands on my shoulders. "As long as you and Mayuri are alive and happy, that's all I care about. That's what I fought so hard for. Please… don't worry about me."

"Th-that's not fair!" I cried, looking up at him. "You struggled and suffered and almost _died_ to protect us, because you care about us, you care about all your friends, but you won't let us care about you!? You won't let us protect _you_?"

He didn't even hesitate. "No. Not if it risks your safety. It's better that I disappear quietly than that we struggle again and again, distort the worldline, break Steins;Gate."

"What if it doesn't?" I said. "We can't know until we try! And I would do anything-"

He shook his head. "No. It's too dangerous. Please, Kurisu…" His voice was very soft, but cracking around the edges again. "Forget me. Live your life. Be happy."

I looked up into those sad amber eyes, the eyes of a tired, desperately broken man. It froze my heart. "Do… do you _want_ to die?"

His eyes dropped away from mine and I had my answer. His eyes were already dead…

But I was here now, the whole group was back together – except for the one person I couldn't remember who they were – so that should give him more hope, shouldn't it? Had he just been existing all this time, going through the motions for Mayuri and Daru's sake? And now that an easy way out came to him, he would just let himself go without even trying?

"You can't," I choked out. "You can't leave me. I won't let you."

"There's no need to worry. Daru is my right hand. You can rely on him whenever you're in need." His expression softened, looking at me tenderly. "Mayuri might not seem like it, but she's more mature than you in some respects. During the hard times, you can cry on her shoulder. She'll always be there. Feyris and Rukako, they'll help, too." He smiled. "There's nothing to worry about."

"Idiot! That's not what I'm trying to say-

He bent his head and I froze. A hesitation, a breath, and then he kissed me full on the mouth. My breath caught in my throat, my words died with my breath, all I could sense was his arms around me, his breath on my face, his mouth on mine. All I could do was kiss him back, clinging desperately to him.

"Oh," I said when we parted, more tears falling down my cheek, "you are cruel. You tell me to forget you, and then you go on and make a memory that leaves a deep impression in the hippocampus…"

"I'm sorry," he whispered, his eyes bleak.

"You're so cruel…" I reached up and kissed him again as more tears flowed, pressing my lips urgently against his. His arms tightened around me, and my grip tightened on the lapels of his lab coat.

I would do as he asked, if I could. He was always protecting us, even at the cost of his existence…

.

.

.

I was reading comments over on the Steins;Gate wiki, and someone pointed out that Kurisu's journey is a lot like Okabe's journey through the Beta worldline – she goes through time twice to try to save him, and fails the first time… Okay, I understand that, but I wish she'd shown more gumption about it.

On rewatching her first time-leap, leaping back to the party and all the cues there was really subtly effective; it's too bad it didn't really fit in this worldline. I did use the sad confrontation scene almost verbatim, because that was a really great monologue. There are a lot of really great scenes in this movie! I love the voice-acting so much. I also added a couple things I felt Kurisu should have brought up.

I also don't like overusing Suzuha. I feel Suzu spends a lot of time jumping back to hang out with her teen-aged dad, and it feels too convenient sometimes. Oh, she'll show up in my fic, I can't get to kid-Okabe any other way, and in the end I couldn't get to adult-Okabe any other way either, but she gets less time here.


	4. Chapter 4: Antarctic Primavera

Chapter 4: Antarctic Primavera

.

I went home to my hotel, alone. Was there anything else I could say to him, anything at all? Not necessarily to change his mind, because his resolve was set and I knew nothing I could say would change that.

I stared at my phone all night, thinking, sometimes crying. Was I ready to live in a world without Okabe? At least it wasn't like he died violently, like Mayuri or I had. He just… ceased to exist in this worldline, and then was overwritten. Like computer data being formatted, changing the past to match the present. And he was facing it with dignity. Dignity I had once thought would be difficult for a self-proclaimed 'mad scientist' to have.

Damn him and his heroic qualities. There was no one in the world like Okabe Rintarou, with his energy, his intelligence, his dramatic make-believe world, his steadfast caring heart. And now there wouldn't be anyone like him again.

Would I even remember? If I didn't, not even that unsettling feeling, that would be best, even if my life would be more dull for it. If I did, even a little… life would be torture.

The sun rose and I was still staring at my dark phone, unable to stop trying to think of ways to keep him here. Why was he falling out of this worldline, anyway, when he'd fought so hard to bring us to it? This worldline might not contain time travel, but it was only made possible by time travel. What did it mean?

My phone buzzed in my hand; one message. I flicked it open instantly.

"Goodbye." One word. That was all. I clutched my breaking heart and wailed. He was too cruel. How could I say goodbye back? I didn't want to say something so final.

He hadn't disappeared until about noon. Maybe I had time? What was I doing today? Laundry, wasn't it? Forget the laundry. I wanted to see him again. Even if he disappeared from in front of me. Even if he vanished from my very arms.

I threw on my clothes and dashed out the door, taking the stairs instead of the elevator, running as if my life depended on it.

I arrived at the lab just before noon, exhausted, covered in sweat in the hot humid Japanese August, crashing through the door without even taking my shoes off. He hadn't been at the laundromat. I prayed he was still here. Although… I remembered my mission, so he must be! He must be!

He was, drinking Dr. Pepper and expounding conspiracy theories to Mayuri. He turned to look at me, at my sweaty, disheveled appearance, but his expression brightened. I opened my mouth to say his name, and then he was gone. _Deja vu_ …

Daru turned around from the computer. "Hi, Makise-shi! You look like you were in a hurry."

"Oh…" I thought. Why had I been running? I had to see someone. That man… O… Oka…be…? Okabe Rintarou! Who no longer existed in this worldline. And my memory was intact, somehow, even if no one else's was. "It's nothing. Don't worry about it."

"Tuturu! Kurisu-chan, Mayushii needs your help," Mayuri called from the couch. "Should Mayushii make the skirt blue or gree-"

"Green," I said. She'd chosen green last time. No need to drag out the discussion again. Even if for her, it would be the first time.

"Hmm. I think you're right. Thanks, Kurisu-chan!"

I looked at them both. They didn't remember. I was the one who had made the memory time leap. I was the Observer, like Okabe had been a year ago. I didn't have Reading Steiner, but I remembered anyway.

Could I follow his last wish?

Could I forget Okabe Rintarou?

.

I tried. I tried my hardest. But the harder you try to forget something, whether it's something that torments you or something you care about… or in this case, both… the more things remind you of it. Especially since I couldn't abandon Mayuri and Daru and the others. I tried for a couple days, since it was difficult to bear being around them while knowing he would never come back, but then Mayuri called me and sounded so sad I had to go back to them.

I had until I left for America again to decide. I had a month.

The month went by all too quickly. The last couple days were looming ahead of me, the last days in which I could safely build the time leap device and use it. And… problems were cropping up in the lab. The electricity bill was through the roof, and Feyris and Ruka were drifting away. Even Mayuri and Daru spent less time there than previously.

 _He_ was the one who had held it all together. The idiot didn't give himself enough credit.

Mayuri was the one who helped me decide. "You've seemed so sad on this visit, Kurisu-chan. Was it not as fun this year?"

Last year… hadn't been particularly _fun_ , with all the half-remembered and fully-remembered fear and agonizing and confusion and sometimes dying. The present worldline had been all right, I supposed, after I got over my father trying to kill me, and a mad scientist walked up to me on the street three weeks later and told me I was his assistant. But she was right. It had been more exhilarating, in any worldline, to meet _him_ and bounce ideas off him, to butt heads and tease and collaborate. My lab in America was so much more dull, even if about a thousand times more professional. "It's not that, Mayuri. It's… I can't talk about it." I was grieving someone who wasn't technically dead. How awkward.

"Did someone close to you go away?" she asked quietly, and I started, almost dropping my ramen, which I was eating with the fork _he_ had given me. It was bad for me emotionally, I knew, but I really hated chopsticks! "Mayushii's been having this feeling that someone went away. Everything seems quiet for some reason. Daru's been feeling it too."

I put the fork down and stared at her until she blushed and looked away. "Mayuri…"

"I-it's just a feeling! Mayushii doesn't know what it means, it's just a silly thought…"

"It's not silly," I told her. "If I say the name Hououin Kyouma, does it mean anything to you?" I couldn't help making my voice deep and resounding on the pompous name.

"I… I don't know…"

"We must change the world's ruling structure? Plunge the world into chaos? Drink the intellectual drink of the chosen? Fight the Organization?"

She looked troubled. "But Hououin Kyouma…"

"Is Okabe Rintarou." My heart swelled painfully on saying his name again, and I pressed on before I could break down. "Okarin? You told me once you were his hostage."

Her eyes brightened. "That does sound familiar, like something Mayushii heard in a dream! I… I don't remember who that is, but… Okarin. Okarin… When I say the name, I feel warm inside! I won't ask how you knew, Kurisu-chan – you know somehow, and that means that you must be right."

"Right?"

"About Okarin! He really existed, didn't he?"

I nodded. "He wanted me to forget, but I can't forget. And even though you and Hashida and Urushibara-san didn't time-leap, you remember him too, I can tell."

"What are you going to do, Kurisu-chan?"

My grip tightened on my fork. "I'm going to bring him back. Somehow. I don't know how. I need his help. Dammit, Jim, I'm a neurologist, not a mad scientist."

Mayuri looked confused, though not, I think, by the nerd reference. "How are you going to get his help?"

"Luckily, I do remember how to build the time leap device," I said, and couldn't resist a mad-scientist-y "ohohoho", which made Mayuri giggle.

I talked to the others. They remembered, too. _Your mightily annoying self won't disappear from anyone's heart, no matter how hard you try_.

I'd arrived in Japan on August 9th. Okabe disappeared on the 13th, the anniversary of Mayuri's original death. I didn't know if that was important, but I suspected it was. I needed as much time as I could get with him – to figure out how to get him back. I set the time leap device for the 10th and hoped he would listen this time.

.

I blinked and lowered the phone from my ear. It was so disconcerting, the horrible melting feeling as my consciousness moved through time, and then finding myself in a completely different place and position. Today we were at Yanabayashi Shrine, visiting Ruka. From what I remembered, I'd already given my lecture for the day in the morning.

I looked around. Mayuri was here, kicking her heels against the stone wall she was sitting on, and Ruka, dressed as a shrine maiden, was energetically practicing with the 'magic' sword Okabe had once given him, the 'demon sword Samidare'. And there…

"Okabe," I said softly, and he broke off in the middle of rambling about spirits and demons and things to glance at me, then did a double-take.

He'd noticed again. Of course he would. But he'd better not bring it up here.

"Carry on, Rukako!" he commanded in a booming Kyouma voice. "Mayuri, observe carefully and make sure that every stroke is perfect! I need to speak with my assistant about our next move to thwart the Organization."

"Okay!" Mayuri said and giggled.

He nodded to me in a frighteningly serious way and we went around to the other side of the Shrine, where he turned to me, looming over me again. "You just time-leapt, didn't you!" he said, trying to keep his voice down this time. "Don't you remember how dangerous that is!? Didn't I specifically say never to mess with time under any circumstances?"

Heard it. "I know! But you're going to disappear at noon on August the 13th, and I need your help to stop it!" I backed up before he could grab me and shake me.

"What do you mean, disappear?"

"You're going to vanish into thin air in front of my eyes, in front of everyone's eyes, and the worldline will immediately pretend you ever existed. But I can't forget. I tried. You told me to. I can't."

"And what happens when you try to stop it and you fail?" He was hissing, trying not to let his anger and fear get the better of him. At least he wasn't shattering in front of my eyes this time. "If it's the will of Steins;Gate that I vanish, then that's how it is!"

My temper flared back at him. "You think that Steins;Gate can't branch and become not-Steins;Gate anymore? Once someone develops time travel, the worldline becomes fixed, with the future all plotted out beyond time. In Steins;Gate, at least, time travel is never developed, despite all the wrinkles in continuity last year, so we can't know the future, if it's fixed or not. Steins;Gate was the only worldline to navigate the convergences of my death and Mayuri's death without anyone dying, but you think that it's set in stone from then on? You yourself said the one thing about Steins;Gate was that the future was unknown here, that it had infinite possibilities. So you can't tell me not to find the future that has you in it!"

He took a step back, looking stunned. "Kurisu…"

I shook my head angrily, trying not to cry. "You'll fight for me, you'll almost _die_ for me, but you won't let me fight for you? That's not fair at all. I'm an adult, not a glass doll you saved from breaking once. And if the others knew, they'd all agree. You were there for us. Can't we be there for you?" It was the same argument all over again, but I had much more conviction on my side this time. He had to listen. He _had_ to.

"Even if you have the means, the past must not be changed. You must not turn chance into reality! It doesn't matter why, even to try to save me!"

"You've told me everything. I've considered it carefully. The stakes aren't as traumatizing for me as they were for you. You're not dying violently in front of my helpless eyes. But if you _think_ I'm just going to live my life without you while remembering that you were here, you have another _think_ coming, because you're completely mistaken. Even the others can't. I talked to them before I came back. I can't. I _can't_."

His face settled into unhappy lines. "What happens when someone else dies because of something that changed? Could you live with that?"

"I know the risks," I said. "I don't want to change anything. You said last time that the world never changes in a way that's convenient for you. So I have to think around that. And I need your help to figure it out."

"Last time… how many times have you time-leaped so far?"

"Only twice."

"Even though I asked you not to? Even though this is my fate, for daring to change the world?"

"You don't believe in fate!" I exclaimed, clenching my fists. "That's why you broke your heart and soul over and over and over again for my and Mayuri's sake! And just because I love you doesn't mean that I'm just going to do whatever you sa-" My eyes widened and I clapped my hands over my mouth, my face flushing bright red.

He looked startled as well, amber eyes wide as saucers, mouth hanging open, frozen in place.

"…That's the first time I've said that properly in any worldline, isn't it?" I mumbled through my hands.

He nodded slowly, finally remembering to breathe. We both dropped our gazes to the ground. Why? He'd already told me in California that he loved me, that he'd love me no matter the place, time, or worldline. Why should _he_ be embarrassed?

I squared my shoulders, mustered my courage, and faced him again. "Well. It's true. I love you. And that's why I'm going to save you."

He looked like he wanted to argue more, but I'd won this time. And it only took an L-bomb. With an effort, he schooled his emotions back under control, then glanced at me with a hint of teasing. "I always knew you were madly in love with me."

I whapped him in the arm. "Don't push it."

His smile became resigned, and a little bit sad. "Sorry." He reached out to touch my face, to caress my cheek, and I couldn't help but lean into it. "I'm terrified for you, but you're a strong, stubborn woman. I don't want to, but I… I'll help you. If I can."

"Thank you." I reached up to cup the hand that was stroking my face, and suddenly we were in each other's arms, clinging to each other fiercely.

.

.

Dates are changed on purpose.


	5. Chapter 5: Ventral Pallidum Insomnia

Chapter 5: Ventral Pallidum Insomnia

.

It was August 12th on the sixth or seventh time leap. We'd made some progress, after I convinced him to help each time, although a lot of it was theoretical since neither of us wanted to risk rebuilding the Phone Microwave and jumping worldlines again. Yet, at least. This meant that understanding the 'how' of the matter was pretty much beyond our reach. But we could still try to figure out the 'why', and that could lead me to useful answers.

Okabe had confessed that his migraines were actually moments when he'd start seeing and feeling other worldlines, which sort-of-but-not-really explained why there would be moments when he was there and then not there, and then there again. So far, the only situation in which anyone had been physically moved out of or within a worldline was if there was a time machine involved. But again, we weren't going to learn 'how', not yet, anyway.

"I believe that Steins;Gate is unstable," he announced one day, and I stared at him in disbelief.

"You can't be serious," I said. "Is that why you're popping in and out? Do you think it will happen to the rest of us?"

"No, I don't think that it will happen to you… but it's definitely not stable. It only exists because of manipulating time, yet there is no way to manipulate time that exists within its frame. Isn't that impossible? And what if," he continued, leaning his lanky frame against the whiteboard and tapping a marker against his scruffy chin, "it's that I spent so much time rewinding that one worldline, the one in which Mayuri first died, that I'm more… 'anchored' there than in this one? My mind considers that worldline to be more real than this one, and somehow takes my body along for the ride. Does that make any kind of sense?"

I thought about it. "That's a very difficult question to answer, but… reality is directly linked to our perception. I see this marker, I feel it in my hands, so I accept it as real because that fits in with my understanding of the world around me. If I didn't believe you, I would have called your experiences hallucinations: perceptions not influenced by stimuli within the collective reality the rest of us are experiencing within this worldline. Perhaps caused by a seizure within the temporal lobe, causing both these experiences and intense feelings of deja vu…"

"But I do believe you. I'm not going to write off the idea that you've had seizures entirely, but normally people don't reject the reality they've been experiencing so hard that they physically enter a different one, even when having seizures. That's…"

"Impossible," he finished for me, with a grimace.

"Exactly. As for your mind considering it to be more real than here and now… Your hippocampus is probably deeply scarred by experiencing similar traumatic events over and over and over, as you said… You've 'practiced' living in that worldline. Living in this worldline, without repetition – except that caused by my stubbornness – it's far less practiced, isn't it? One take, no edits. So it's no wonder you have trouble accepting this reality."

"You're right… A lot of my flashbacks are of… that time." His face closed down and he shuddered, just slightly.

I resisted the urge to hug him, to stroke the tension out of his lean shoulders. "How sad… no matter how much we may wish to forget them, some memories will remain with us forever… All that strong sadness and fear you experienced, all the undeserved guilt and self-reproach you still carry… No one can erase it… And yet the worldlines steal you from us and every memory we ever had of you, even though we want to remember you very much!"

"It's a contrast, certainly," he said, glancing at me with a shadowy smile on his face.

I almost didn't see it, still musing. "And you see the same people, the same places, hear the same words, and 'deja vu' isn't merely an odd feeling, a temporal discrepancy between long and short-term memory, or even what 'normal' PTSD survivors go through, but an action that places you back where you shouldn't be… Memories that are real when they shouldn't be… You won peace for this world, is there no peace for you?"

"Maybe not," he said quietly. "But you're working so hard to find out that I can't help but support you."

I shook myself out of my melancholy reverie and got back to business. "So you're not 'anchored' properly in this unstable worldline, and the anniversary of that event is dislodging you, because time is cyclical too. The fluctuations are picking up on all the 'practice' you did of being 'not-here' and using space-time magic to put you where your brain thinks you should be. Okay. Let's take that as our hypothesis for now. What can we do to change that? Does there need to be something new happen in this worldline that's never happened in any other worldline ever for your subconscious to accept this as reality?"

His eyes were distant. "Maybe."

"Well, I told you I loved you, and I've never done that before. Does that count?"

He finally looked at me, amber eyes warm, mouth curled up in amusment. "But surely you will tell me that eventually in a number of worldlines, which doesn't make this one unique. I don't mind hearing it again, though."

I was flustered and blushing and trying not to show it. "Well! Um! Oh, I have a good question! What happens when you leave this worldline? I've rewound it enough, you should remember _something_ , especially with your Reading Steiner."

He blinked in surprise, thinking. "You know what? You're right, but… it's… it's actually difficult for me to remember. Maybe it's because I'm not the Observer this time around, because I have no control over the time travel or worldlines?"

"I suppose that's possible. Do you remember anything at all, though?" I pressed, clutching my marker with both hands.

His gaze trailed off into the distance, his smile flattening out. "It… I remember being… horribly lonely. It's lonely on that worldline. There was no one I knew… possibly no one at all."

"An empty worldline?" I was appalled.

"There were still buildings and things. I was still in Akiba. But I don't remember crowds in the middle of the day, when there really should have been." He came back to himself. "That's all I have right now. I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry," I said, making notes on the whiteboard. "That's not your fault. So it's definitely not the same worldline as any of the ones in which Mayuri – or I – died."

"It doesn't seem to be," he said, and that actually made him seem kind of hopeful.

I wrinkled my forehead. "I wonder… This is pretty far-fetched, but I wonder if I could remember things from other worldlines that my present consciousness hasn't been to yet."

"Huh. That's not something I've considered before. You think that we might dream about it?"

"It's like when I was talking about deja vu… But how would I recognize it as a memory from another worldline? I might get the feeling I'd seen or done something before, but I wouldn't know how to process it or put it into context since my present consciousness didn't directly experience it. Not even as dimly as my present consciousness experienced the worldlines before Steins;Gate. For deja vu experiences that could be from a completely different worldline, one that neither of us have been to… all I can do is be suspicious."

"It's something to think about, for sure. I'm pretty sure Reading Steiner is only for worldlines I've experienced directly. When I was thirteen, when Mayuri... no, it's not important."

"They haven't passed through the hippocampus, so there's no imprint to leave… Although that was one of my main problems with time travel in the first place. How can anyone who's not the Observer remember anything, even as dimly as we do, without having had these signals physically fire in the brain? What do our dreams mean, whether caused by time travel or not?"

"That's definitely not my area of expertise," he said with a grimace.

I smirked at him. "Well, I'm not going to think about it now, although I'll make a note of it. Dreams were going to be my next thesis again anyway. But I'm not going to touch it unless we can't find any other way to reach you."

"All right."

It was painful to watch him, over and over, clutch at his head and wheeze in pain, before and after he would vanish from before my eyes and my very memories of him began to fog over. He seemed to be in so much physical pain and even more emotional and mental pain… but I doubted that ordinary painkillers would do anything for him. Whatever the fluctuations in the worldlines were doing to him, it was something that was beyond the scope of modern medicine. He was so wounded, and as he progressively got worse between August 10th and August 13th each time, I wanted to hold him, as if my touch would sooth these incorporeal hurts. I didn't dare, though.

I still took to buying him painkillers whenever I looped back.

.

We had take-out for dinner, too busy to even think of cooking, and then I stayed too late to go back to my hotel that night, so Okabe kindly put the pillow and blanket from his own bed in the back room onto the couch for me. It wasn't the first time it had happened in these rewound brainstorming sessions, and I was prepared – I had my toothbrush, I had my hairbrush, and I planned to sleep in my clothes instead of my pyjamas.

He appeared in the doorway of his bedroom, without his ubiquitous lab coat over his t-shirt and wearing sweatpants instead of his trousers. It was hot. Wait, what? "Do you need anything else?"

I looked up from where I lay on the couch. "I think I'm fine, thanks."

"Just call if you think of something." He rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly and disappeared back into his bedroom behind the curtain, and I heard the squeak of his bed as he lay down.

I couldn't sleep, my mind still buzzing with our discussions of the afternoon. I was tempted to study the whiteboard that was hanging just above me and to the side, but I restrained myself. It would be there in the morning. I already knew what was written there. I needed to relax.

Easier said than done.

About an hour later, I hadn't heard anything from Okabe; I assumed he was asleep. I pulled out my phone, going to (a)channel to see if anyone had any links to anything useful. I'd done it before; there was no reason to think there would be anything different from the last three or four times I'd rewound time, but I still checked compulsively.

I heard a step on the floor and looked up guiltily. "Okabe?"

"Kurisu… I saw your light. Couldn't sleep?"

"No, not yet. I thought you were."

He shook his head, only very faintly illuminated by the light of my phone. "Even without the… the memories intruding, it's hard to sleep these days." He slumped down, sitting on the floor and leaning back against the front of the couch. "Knowing that I'm going to vanish… knowing that you're working so hard to save me, even though we don't know how without trying something dangerous… It's pretty heavy."

"It is really heavy," I said, sitting up and putting my phone back on the table. Did I dare…? Sure, why not. It was always easier to be honest when it was dark. I reached out and ran my hands through his hair, stroking it back from his forehead. I felt him first tense and then relax under my hands as I kept my soothing motions going. "And I'm starting to understand what you felt when you did things over and over and nothing changed, how helpless you must have felt. But I think about how hard you fought for me, and that steels my resolve." I changed my gestures to massaging the base of his skull, and felt him relax further.

"That feels nice," he murmured.

"I haven't even gone back hardly as many times as you did. And you'll notice I did learn from your experience – I asked you for help right away, because if you couldn't solve that problem alone, then I can't solve this one alone. So I have an advantage there, too."

"You're always the smart one," he said softly.

I smiled wistfully. "Not smart enough to do it alone. You're not afraid, are you?"

"For myself? No. For you… yes, because I don't know what you're going to do, and I can't… I can't help you if it goes wrong. And yes, I did fight so hard for you and Mayuri, and while I can't prevent you from doing anything you really want to do, and it wouldn't be fair if I did…"

"To let me choose as an adult, instead of a glass doll you're afraid of getting broken," I reminded him.

"Yeah, that… But if something does happen to you… I'm going to feel extra-terrible, you know that?"

I let go of his head and put my hands under his arms, tugging him upwards. "Come here, sit beside me." He did so and put his arm around me, and I pulled the blanket over our legs and snuggled into his side. "It's too late for guilt-trips. I have no wish to invalidate your struggle by getting myself hurt." Or killed, but I didn't want to say that. "Just let others protect you for once."

"Says the woman huddled under my arm."

I snorted. "Shut up, Okabe. …And don't go anywhere."

"I'm not going anywhere, Christina." Yet.

I rolled my eyes, but my head was comfortably resting on his shoulder, my left arm was draped across his front. I could feel his breathing, could faintly hear his heartbeat, and his warmth was all around my shoulders. Just this simple pleasure of being near the person I loved, of holding and being held, of being honest to the darkness of his lab/apartment… I'd jump though time until my consciousness failed to save this.

…He wasn't going to remember this, at least not clearly, if I had to jump again. And I would probably have to. I still didn't have enough answers yet.

I adjusted my arm across him and fell asleep, carried by his breathing…


	6. Chapter 6: Divergence Hariolation

I gave up; couldn't get to the past without Suzu-chan! Besides, she has a cute smile. :)

Sky Clad Kansokusha is my soundtrack for Kurisu's determination, just as it was for Okabe's determination in Episode 23. :D

.

Chapter 6: Divergence Hariolation

It was the evening of August 15th, and the time-leap machine was almost finished, practice lending me speed in its construction. But right now, I stared from the text on my phone asking me to come to the roof of the hotel, to the time machine that stood there. "I don't understand."

"You said that you'd say that," the brown-haired girl said patiently. "You decided to break out of the loop you had trapped yourself in, and spent your life developing a proper time machine, although my appearance on this date in this particular worldline certainly helped, apparently. You asked me to come back to now to help you out, to get more answers that you can't reach right now."

"How should I believe you?" I demanded. "How do I know I really sent you? How come I haven't seen you before?"

The girl smiled. "My name is Amane Suzuha." She produced a yellow ball cap and settled it on her head over her braids. "And I don't know. I think the worldline has branched a lot from your actions. Maybe other Suzuhas waited longer to talk to you, after you had already time-leaped back. Maybe in those you never built a time machine."

That hat-! Daru's hat! Hashida Iteru's hat! "You're… his daughter?"

"Yup! And it's nice to meet you in the past, Ba-chan!"

I squeaked in indignation. "Don't call me Ba-chan, Amane-san, I'm only nineteen!"

"Sorry, sorry," Suzuha said, laughing. She had such a happy smile. I liked her already. It was hard to believe she was Daru's daughter. "But please, call me Suzu-chan like you alway- like you will when I'm born properly. You believe me now?"

"Y-yes. So… where- when are we going?"

Her face grew serious. "We're going into the past, to observe Okabe Rintarou in his childhood."

"What good will that do?" I demanded. "How do you know who he is?"

"Why, you told me, Ba-chan!" she said. "And I believed you." She smiled again. "He seems like a really interesting person. I hope you succeed so I can meet him."

"Why the past?" I objected. "How can the answer be in the past, when he isn't even thinking about time travel, then?"

"I don't know, but searching the worldline after he disappeared isn't going to do anything."

"Why would I give him up and _then_ spend my life on this?" I muttered to myself. "That pervert isn't worth this trouble."

Suzuha's eyes bored into mine. "Because you love him."

I blushed crimson and flailed. "W-w-well, but even so- Anyway, I don't know anything about his past! I only have fragments of things he _might_ have told me-"

"You never gave him up," she said, inexorably. "You never gave up hope. He did no less for you, you told me. He changed inevitability for your sake." Her face softened. "I believe, too, that you can find a way. That you can find your way back to Steins;Gate."

"W-well, I…"

"Come on, Ba-chan. You can't know until you try."

"A-all right," I said, and climbed into the space-capsule-like compartment after her.

I wouldn't have believed it possible. Me, build a time machine? Sure, I wrote that paper, but that was only on its theoretical practicality. I wouldn't have dreamed of bothering to build one myself, so obsessed was I with neurology and pleasing my father. And the words she had said, 'the loop you had trapped yourself in', were bothering me as well. Yes, _something_ had to change to progress, because I certainly wasn't making it anywhere just trying to theorize. My stubbornness and intellect alone couldn't reach Okabe.

But now… I could believe it. Now I had something – some _one_ – I wanted to protect so badly I would believe in even that.

.

Rain, soaking me. A boy, across the street, umbrella in hand, amber eyes downcast and melancholy. "O-Okabe…"

I began to move in tandem with him, keeping pace as he trudged along. But my heart would not be calm, and my feet began to run, faster and faster. "Okabe- Okabe!"

He looked up, startled, uncomprehending. Of course, he wouldn't know me yet. I reached the crosswalk and began to bolt across, but my boots slipped on the wet white lines. "Whoop-"

A truck horn, a panicked cry, an umbrella flying-

 _Thud_.

I recovered behind a nearby building with Suzuha, watching the ambulance arrive. Okabe had pushed me out of the way of the truck and gotten hit himself. He was still alive, though, thank goodness.

"He'll be all right," Suzuha said. "He won't die. He doesn't die in this worldline."

"Then it's fixed," I said, still getting my breath back, still recovering from the shock of having my future sort-of-boyfriend almost die for me _again_. "Unchanging. And that means I can't save him in this worldline."

"Maybe, but that's not why we're here. So let's go back a bit and observe again."

.

Despite my best efforts, if we showed up at the same time, Okabe would always get hurt because of me. After several loops of watching him get hit by cars or falling down stairs, I asked Suzuha to go back more in time.

I walked through the quiet rainy town, more calmly now, putting the upsetting memories of blood and broken bones out of my mind. The rain was rather soothing, even though I was getting damp. I pulled my jacket properly around me for once, otherwise my thin white shirt would get soaked through. My footsteps wandered aimlessly without purpose or goal. I trusted I would know what I found when I got there.

There was a small train platform ahead, and I skipped into cover beneath its sheltering roof.

A few minutes later, a black-haired, amber-eyed boy joined me, just sitting quietly. I had to be careful not to get him hit by the train or anything.

He looked so ordinary without his hair brushed back.

"Are you lost?" he asked quietly, unprompted, his voice higher-pitched and young.

I said nothing.

"Me too." Pause. Here we were, two lost children, looking for meaning in a life bound by convergence… "A girl I've known since I was little is really depressed. I don't know what to say to her… I wonder if I'm just useless…"

I listened carefully, and something shifted in my memory. Mayuri's voice, telling me how Hououin Kyouma had saved her after her grandmother died by making her his hostage. "Do you know the story of Hououin Kyouma?"

Amber eyes turned to me, curious.

"He was a scientist," I began. "But not just any scientist. He was a mad scientist, and an exceptional one. He always talked and acted crazy, and people made fun of him. Nobody believed in what he said, his research, or his discoveries. But you see, what he uncovered was something that only he could see. He realized that it could hurt and cause pain and even destroy the world at times. So he tried with all his might to protect everyone. He worked so hard to save the world, and managed to protect all of the people dear to him. But he never let anyone know. He just kept playing a fool and letting everyone laugh at him."

It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair, what he had to go through. And I couldn't reproach him for hiding his pain away, for not trusting us… If I hadn't been through similar things to him until now, how could I have believed him before? Even now that I knew, my burden would never be equal to his burden… I could share in it, but never fully understand it or take it away… He would always be protecting me that way.

Perhaps I could let him do that for me, at least.

"That's a sad story," young Okabe said.

"Maybe it is," I said, and turned to smile at him. "But he was so brave, so strong, I think it's a wonderful story." I leaned closer and kissed him on the cheek. "You would be a great Hououin Kyouma, the way you want to protect your friend."

He thought silently for a minute, then stood, hefting his school backpack.

"There's someone waiting for you," I said, not quite making a question of it. But I knew the answer already.

He set off with a determined step, faster and faster. I followed him at a distance, watching as he dashed to a cemetery. There was Mayuri, a little shorter, standing in a familiar pose, reaching out with one arm to the sky, where a tiny ray of light had broken through the clouds and shone down on her.

Okabe charged up to her, throwing his arms around her. I didn't hear what they said, though I felt a pang at my heart that he cared so much for Mayuri. It was all right, I told myself. He loved Mayuri very much, he always would. But he would come to love me too, once he met me.

The light grew stronger, shining around them, the boy and the girl standing in the rain, almost looking like ghosts through the bright raindrops… Almost as if… outside of time…

.

"Did you learn anything?" Suzuha asked me.

"I don't know," I said. "But I have new ideas."

.

"I discovered something," I announced to adult Okabe on the next loop. I wondered vaguely if my visit in that one worldline, or any worldline, had carried over, if he remembered me. But now was not the time to find out.

He looked up from whatever he was typing. "What is it?"

"I know where you're going. I just don't know how to get there."

His eyes opened very wide and serious. "Where am I going, then?"

"You're not anchored in this worldline, right? So you're all going to… a… the… space between worldlines, if that makes sense."

"It doesn't," he said. "I call them worldlines, but it's not like they're actually threads in time-space and there's gaps between them. It's more like-" He stopped to think, and I pounced on the opportunity.

"Well, it's also a fact that you're _between_ worldlines. You're not anchored to _any_ worldline." I pointed at him dramatically. "That's how I know we're not on Steins;Gate anymore!"

His eyes narrowed. "Steins;Gate doesn't rely on me."

"Yes, it does!" I told him. "Steins;Gate is the worldline without the sadness brought by time travel, the worldline with the unknown future. I know you're not going to be here tomorrow, so I know the future. We're not on Steins;Gate. It branched when you disappeared."

"You yourself said that we don't know if the future of Steins;Gate is fixed or not, because we're not going to invent time travel on it."

"W-well- If you disappear, I'm going to invent time travel, so logically, whether or not Steins;Gate is fixed, we won't be on Steins;Gate!"

"So don't invent time travel and let me go!"

"I know you want to give up, but I'm not going to! I've run out of non-time travel options, and especially when my future self sends Suzu-chan back in time to help me out-"

"Wait, the Part-time Warrior was here?"

"The who-" More of his silly nicknames? How come Suzuha got a catchy nickname and I had to put up with The Zombie? How did he know her, when she didn't know him? "Yes, she was. She only came after you left, though, so you won't be able to meet her."

"That's too bad…" He smiled sadly. "I would have liked to see her again."

"How do you know her, if she doesn't know you?"

He looked startled, then nodded. "Another worldline. Did she tell you who she is?"

I glanced around to make sure Daru really wasn't there, and then nodded back. "She's Hashida's daughter. Is she the one who's going to show up seven- sorry, six years from now?"

"That's right. I wonder why she's always the one picked to drive the bus?"

"Probably because she loves her Aunt Kurisu who made the time machine," I teased.

"Hey, for one of my worldlines it was because she loved her Uncle Okabe and his time machine." He grinned at me and I rolled my eyes. "I guess she just really likes what we do. Well, back to work then." He rolled up his sleeves and sighed. "No rest for the terminally ill."

"Don't even joke about that," I scolded him, grabbing a marker. "Now let's see if we can figure out how to get outside of time, assuming we have access to Suzu-chan's time machine."

.

I stepped back from the whiteboard after another two days of plotting diagrams and calculations. Our efforts had encompassed numerous sheets of paper taped to the wall around the whiteboard and little coloured sticky notes everywhere, including one stuck to his shoulder by accident.

But I was so close, and still so far… I just knew what was happening, Suzuha had helped immensely… and yet…

"You seem tired," he told me. "You want to take a break?"

I bowed my head, feeling suddenly exhausted, mentally and emotionally. "Even with all this… I… still can't save you yet."

He gave me a long, serious look, and I suddenly remembered he had once told me in a broken whisper that he couldn't save me. "How many loops have you made?"

"I'm not sure. Only twenty or twenty-five. And maybe five with Suzu-chan." I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders. "I'm not giving up yet, only… You're trapped behind the unyielding walls of time, and I'm beating on them with all my might, and I understand a little how you felt, back then… I just want to punch through, break them down, and drag you back physically, as if holding on to you will keep you from vanishing." He was thrown out of the world, completely and utterly alone, a horrible metaphor for how he felt. If I could only make my feelings truly reach him...

I was getting upset and tried not to sniffle. "The only really good thing is that I have 'lots' of time to figure it out." The time loops didn't seem to be really hurting anyone, since I wasn't meddling much. Except for the ones where I got him hit by a car, but those loops were over. No more of that.

"Christina…"

"No 'tina'," I said automatically.

He ignored that and continued. "This can't be good for you, having more and more memories of this week than actually happened. You're the neurologist, isn't there a limit? You're not going to drive yourself crazy or anything, right?"

I glared at him. "You're not allowed to talk. But I don't know. Since we can't trust humanity not to misuse time travel, the scientific community is never going to get the chance to find out. But I refuse to let my present consciousness to go too far from your consciousness."

He put his head on one side. "I think you're addicted to me."

"Don't be ridiculous!" I fumed. "Just because I'm not willing to give you up doesn't mean that I'm addicted!"

A smirk was spreading across his face. "You can quit at any time?"

"Maybe I will!" I snapped. But I didn't really mean that.

He moved closer to me and wrapped his long arms around me, heedless of Daru computing in the corner. "It's okay. I'm all right with it. If you decide enough is enough, that's okay."

Oh, that jerk. Twisting my angry knee-jerk reactions against me. How could he still be so patient after living through this so many times!? Knowing what lay ahead for him!? I had been about to relax into his embrace, but at that, I took a half-step back, my palms against his chest. "You're impossible!"

"And you're terrifying," he said, but he was still smiling. "That burning look in your eyes – you really aren't going to give up, are you?"

"No!" I cried, my determination gathering yet again, fisting my hands in his lapels. "I'm not letting you go!"

"I guess I can't leave my assistant to her own devices, can I?"

"I'm not your assistant! But no, you can't! I won't allow it!" He was leaning in, I was reaching up, relaxing again into his arms-

And I almost fell on my face as he vanished. The one stray sticky note fluttered to the ground. Noon on the 13th again, dangit! I'd run out of time again!

"One more time!" I cried to Daru, still lurking in the corner. "I'm going back one more time!"

"Starting the hack now, mistress," Daru teased. "Yeah, you can't have your lovey-dovey time interrupted by silly things like accidental worldline-jumping- Ow!" I had thrown a marker at him; it bounced off his hat.

"You pervert! Get to work!" I told him, and ran to buy parts, red hair flying, my determination building with every step.

.

I ended up not going back in time this time, although I still built the time-leap device. I got a text from Suzuha again on the 15th, and went to the roof of the lab to discover that she had arrived there, this time.

She stared at me when she saw me, until I started to be uncomfortable. "What's the matter? Is there something on my face?"

"Er, well, no, it's just…" She looked awkward. "You look different, Ba-chan."

I narrowed my eyes at her. "You didn't stare like that last time. Did I tell you not to tell me what's different?"

"Um, yes…?"

Drat. Foiled by myself. I hoped it wasn't anything embarrassing. "Okay, can this time machine reach between worldlines?"

Her placement on the roof of the lab was convenient, as it turned out I had alterations to make to it. At the moment, it would only go back and forth in time along this worldline, and from seeing Okabe get hit by a car and surviving last time, I guessed it wouldn't be able to make the worldline diverge. We needed to get it to move not back and forth, but laterally, to a 'time' that shouldn't exist. Suzuha told me that I hadn't tried to build it with that capability in the future since it was too far away from Okabe's last known point in this worldline to be certain of results. She had some notes to help me, though.

She seemed more serious this time around, at least for the first couple days, and I wasn't sure why. But she got along great with Mayuri and Ruka and Daru, and even Moeka downstairs in the shop, until I wondered if my impression was just my imagination. She still had the same bright smile, the same wit, the same bounciness. I invited her to stay in my hotel room, since she shouldn't have to sleep in the time machine. As we worked on altering the time machine together, I got to know her a bit better, and wished that Okabe could meet her too, since he knew her as well. With the lab members truly assembled, we would have had so much fun!

But the only reason she was here was because he wasn't here. Once he was brought back, once we'd made it back to Steins;Gate, she would disappear out of our worldline with her time machine and we'd have to wait six years to meet her again.

.

The 24th of August was our first test day. Daru wasn't present, out on a 'date' with Yuki. They were playing Rai-net, and I'd bullied him into going to see her in person. I hoped that didn't mess up the worldline, but honestly, he was being such a chicken. He'd gone out with her on the 24th the last time I got this far in time, but only on the internet without face-cam.

Suzuha, Mayuri and I were all in the lab and now we climbed to the roof to the time machine. "What are we testing?" Mayuri asked, clapping her hands while hugging a stuffed Uupa and bouncing.

"We're going to send a text message outside the worldline," Suzuha said. "You all still have Okabe-san's number, even though it's unlisted right now, right? With the changes Ba-chan and Tousan and I have made, it should have enough power to send at least a signal out. We don't know if Okabe-san will be able to answer or not, but I'm thinking not, since Ba-chan never said anything about it. But, if all goes well, we can move on to testing bigger things, and then see if we can go there ourselves." And then bring him back and move the worldline.

"All those changes have made my brain hurt," I complained. "After the text-message test, I want to sit around and eat pudding and do nothing for a bit."

"If Kurisu-chan's brain hurts, it must _really_ be complicated!" Mayuri said cheerfully, waving her stuffed Uupa's arms at the time machine.

"All right," Suzuha said, tapping on her remote control. "I'm starting it up. Mayuri-chan, you have the text?"

"Mayushii is all ready to go!" Mayuri turned her phone around to show the short message: 'Tuturu, Okarin, testing! Answer? :D' "What are we going to call the test?"

Suzuha and I looked at each other. "Call it?" Suzuha echoed.

"Like, Okabe's silly Operation titles?" I asked. "It's just a test…" Mayuri's eyebrows rose and I backpedalled. "Um, let's see… maybe… Operation Yggdrasil?" My knowledge of Norse mythology was lacking compared to Okabe's, but from what I vaguely remembered, Yggdrasil connected all the worlds of Norse legend, so it was appropriate, right? I hoped he hadn't used that one yet. With my luck, he probably had.

"Okay! We're beginning Operation Yggdrasil!" Mayuri cried.

Suzuha smiled. "Well, the machine is on, systems show normal, if a little high from all the extra power we're pulling. Go ahead and send whenever you're ready!"

Mayuri's face became adorably determined, and she mashed her finger on the 'send' button.

The hum of the time machine changed.

"Should it do that?" Mayuri asked, leaning over to look inside.

"Mayuri-chan, get back!" Suzuha screamed, dropping her remote.

The time machine shone with a piercing light, brighter than the sun. Even as I turned away to futilely shield my eyes, I felt Suzuha grab my hand, dragging me towards the roof stairs. I heard her scream Mayuri's name again, but I couldn't see, black spots in front of my eyes. She shoved me fiercely, and I skittered down the stairs, clinging to the handrail.

We burst into the lab, my eyes still blinking back to normalcy. There was an ominous rumbling whine from above us, and the feeling of a vibration thrumming through the whole building. "What's happening!?"

"I lost her – Mayuri-chan, I lost her! She- she just evaporated-"

"Suzu-chan!"

She shoved the time-leap headset on my head. "Now I know why you were that way… We're in the Chiyoda Bombing! I didn't- Quick, go back, go back-"

Enter key. Brilliant light. Ear-bursting sound. The ceiling bursting in, a beam of rebar impaling Suzuha next to me…

.

In the original version of this chapter, Kurisu set off a black hole while trying to build her own time machine and destroyed the whole world (Suzuha wasn't present). That was a bit over the top. (Also I think Kurisu just got her mad scientist's license, having destroyed a city at least one time, mwahahaha.)


	7. Chapter 7: Dreamworld Poiesis

One of the things I found hard to believe was that Kurisu would just put up with being slapped, even in the depths of her despair. So she doesn't.

I also messed with worldline formatting to make the R worldline the extra-special thing it ought to be. : P

I know in the movie, it's Operation Norn… but Fenris is a different operation, a different worldline, a demon wolf who bit off the hand of Tyr when the Aesir bound him and refused to let him go.

.

Chapter 7: Dreamworld Poiesis

.

I popped back into myself, throwing my arms over my head reflexively and waiting for a deathblow that never came. The world was still in place, nothing was exploding, everything was fine… It was several days earlier, out at May Queen. Okabe was looking at me with concern. "Another failed future?"

"I… I need a minute," I mumbled, and jumped up from the table, rushing to the women's restroom. I locked myself in a stall and tried not to hyperventilate, tried not to cry hysterically. What had I done?

I had done the best I could. And I needed the extra power in the time machine to reach the time between worlds, that was what all my calculations said. But in that worldline, Makise Kurisu had actually destroyed Akiba. Had failed not only to bring Okabe Rintarou back, or even to contact him, but also evaporated the future for Mayuri and Suzuha and hundreds, maybe thousands of other people in Akiba. The fact that there were infinite other timelines didn't make my failure less horrifying. I covered my mouth with my hands and rocked back and forth, crying silently.

How could my future self have known what would happen, and still send Suzuha back in time? How could I have experienced that, and not stopped it?

Perhaps I had amnesia? I had been caught in the blast too, but I must have survived in order to build the time machine… No wonder Suzuha had stared at me when she saw me in that worldline. I couldn't have survived unscathed, and amnesia was very likely, either from physical trauma or psychological trauma, or both. How was it possible that I'd survive at all? The forces inside that machine would have obliterated all of Akiba, possibly all of Chiyoda, hopefully not all of Tokyo. It was impossible for me to have survived. It was good that Daru, at least, had been in another district…

No! I couldn't hide behind such a painful and false hope. Whether or not future-Kurisu had amnesia of the events leading up to the destruction of the time machine, it still remained that I had messed up. Maybe Okabe was right. Maybe I should give him up, give up time travel. Never see his scruffy smiling face again, never hear his obnoxious Kyouma declamations again, never feel his warm mouth on mine ever again…

I wasn't ruthless enough to sacrifice our friends to bring him back. That wouldn't make him happy. That wouldn't make _me_ happy. The image of Suzuha impaled was burned into my mind, her body dead before she had time to react. I rested my head on my knees and sobbed.

"Kurisu-chanya?" Feyris's voice. "Ku-chan, are you in there, nya? Kyouma's lurking outside like a naughty boy, nya, so I promised I'd check on you…"

"I failed," I whispered. "I failed… I killed everyone… I failed, Feyris-san! I-I can't do it!"

The stall door opened. Hadn't I locked it? Feyris was standing there, looking adorably angry. "Yes, you can! So you messed up once, how are you going to solve time-travel without making mistakes ever, nya?"

"I destroyed _everything!_ " I shouted. "He would be so angry if I told him-"

 _Slap_.

I reached up to touch my stinging cheek. "Did- did you just slap me?"

Feyris looked uncertain for a second, but then rallied. "Do you always destroy the world in every future? No! So this isn't one of those fixed events, this is an accident-"

"Don't you dare slap me!" I screamed at her. "That's not going to help 'pull myself together' or whatever you think is going to happen! I know what I did! I know what it means! The fact that it wasn't convergence, that I can try again, doesn't negate it! Don't be ridiculous!"

Feyris fell back, looking regretful. "I'm sorry, Kurisu-chan. I've seen Kyouma like that before, and it's helped him in the past… I'm sorry."

"Okay," I said, trying to regain control over myself. "Just… give me a minute to freak out. Go feed him Dr. Pepper and omurice. Put it on my bill, not his. I'll be out in a minute and then we'll tackle this again. It wasn't the whole world, just…" I had to squeeze my eyes shut and turn my face away miserably.

"Okay," she said. "I'll do that. I hope you feel better, nya. What should I tell him?"

"Just… just tell him it didn't go well, and let me explain it all to him later. He'll be angry, but I'm the one he needs to be angry at."

"He only gets angry because he's afraid," Feyris said very quietly. "Under all the evil laughter, Kyouma is very fragile."

"I know," I said. "I'm trying not to hurt him. But I won't let him go, either."

"I support you, Ku-chan. Nya."

.

I told him later the same evening, and he was angry, but I cried… I cried so hard, he softened and held me, stroking my hair as I finally vented the pain and horror and grief. "Please," was all he said.

 _Please stop. Please don't hurt yourself or the people around you again. Please let there be an end._

 _Please let me die_.

I clung to him tighter in response. _Maybe I will_.

.

It was hard to go about my daily life after that. Especially my lectures, which I'd still been having to do loop after loop after loop, just in case _that_ loop happened to be the last one. I could give them by heart now, and did, but the next day… My boss took me aside after my first lecture. "Makise-san, are you all right?"

"I'm really not feeling well today," I said, which wasn't a lie. "I can't explain it… I just feel terrible."

"You look terrible." My boss was not known for being particularly tactful. "Why don't you take the rest of the day off, and tomorrow too? If you're getting sick, it'll help minimize the effects. Let me know if you'll be in to lecture the day after."

"Thank you," I said, and went home to my hotel to hide in my giant bed for most of the day.

But come evening, I was up again, organizing my notes on my laptop, trying to figure out what had gone wrong.

I couldn't sleep, but I did manage to rest a while that night, and the next day I felt more like myself again, walking over to the lab as soon as I could to see what was going on, even if I didn't bring up time travel while Okabe was still around. I didn't feel I could ask him for help right now, after I'd failed and made him upset, even though he was one of the very few people who could help me.

Instead, I tried to help him with his air conditioner project; it had been neglected through most of the loops and this change would be good for me. I'd decide on whether to keep going later.

.

The 13th came. Okabe left. I still dithered, still obsessed over the notes on my laptop, still tried to forget Suzuha.

The 15th came. I got a text from Suzuha. I wondered if I could bear seeing her, but forced myself to go anyway.

She was alive and well, smiling as she saw me on the roof of the lab. I couldn't help it and sank to my knees, bursting into tears.

"Oh no, oh no, what's wrong, Ba-chan?" Suzuha asked, putting her arms around my shoulders. "Did something happen? Did you have a fight with Kyouma before he left? You didn't say anything about that before I came…"

Her concern was overwhelming, and it was a while before I could speak again. "I'm-I'm sorry, Suzu-chan. The worldline before this one… I messed up so bad…"

"It's okay, it's okay. We're in a different worldline now. Whatever happened, it's over now. I'm here to help!"

I blinked through tears up at the time machine. "I guess I'm still trying to reach Okabe, aren't I."

"Yup! Before I left, you told me some things to tell you. Firstly: this time machine can move laterally through worldlines without doing anything to change the worldline itself. Normally you have to change the world to move to a different worldline, right? You've managed to break free of that. We tested it in 2036, although it's a little bit awkward to meet… basically other versions of people you know! I met some weird versions of Tousan and Ruka-san… Oh! I even met Kyouma!" She giggled. "He called me Part-time Warrior, I'm not sure why. But I like it. I like him. So I'm super-ready to help you get him back."

"You met… Okabe?" That proved it, that this machine could move through worldlines. But could it reach outside of worldlines…

"The other thing that I was supposed to tell you is that the reason why things didn't go well in the last worldline is because you just increased the power and sent a message to everywhen without providing proper coordinates. So that's one thing we have to do first, is find out what the coordinates for the R worldline-"

"The R worldline?" I asked. "Why did I call it that?"

"I'm not sure. I thought it might be for Rintarou, but you never used his given name except when being formal or exasperated, and then only with his family name. So I don't know. Anyway, that what you called it, so I call it that too."

"So it is a worldline?" I asked. That would be nice to clarify.

"Kiiiind of… I don't really understand it, but I brought notes!" Good, notes. I could just read the notes. That didn't mean I'd build anything.

I looked at her closely as she brought me a large sheaf of print-outs. "Is there anything I should know about in this worldline? Am I deformed or scarred at all? Were there any horrific accidents or disasters in places where I lived? You mentioned Urushibara-san, do you also know Mayuri and Feyris-san and Kiryuu Moeka-san?"

She thought for a moment. "Nothing bad has happened to you as far as I know, at least you look pretty much the same twenty five years from now. Which is pretty good, Ba-chan!"

"Don't call me Ba-chan," I told her, blushing.

"Heheh, sorry. Habit! Don't know of any horrific accidents, although there have been some close calls with people almost discovering the time machine… But no one found it before I left, and you said that you'd destroy it when I returned to the future, so that no one could take over the world with it. And yes, I know all those people! They're all in the Future Gadgets Lab that you run!"

" _I_ run?"

"Yup!" She grinned. "You look so surprised! But hey, no one else was better for it!"

"Except that maniac," I muttered, turning back to the pages in my hand. My own notes were rather confusing, and I pored over them for the rest of the day and night. Suzuha came to stay at my hotel room again, and her warm liveliness did more to dispel the horror of her death than anything else.

If I got her killed again, I'd never forgive myself.

Okabe had lived through Mayuri's death until he'd come to doubt his humanity. I doubted I'd get that far. I wasn't as strong as he was.

.

My notes theorized a few things that set me off on new mental paths. Future-Kurisu talked of something called a divergence meter, which apparently I could find in the Future Gadget Lab somewhere, which would tell me what worldline I was on. Relative to what, I didn't know. It wasn't important, apparently, as the time 'outside' time was apparently a worldline that was… embryonic.

I frowned. I had such a way with words, but it didn't help me understand – ah, here! Future-Kurisu apparently meant that it wouldn't register on the divergence meter, as it didn't have enough digits to show. It was one of the many worldlines that only existed because of infinity, containing nothing but impossible possibility: a 21st century Earth with no living humans. Besides Okabe, hopefully.

I'd have to find the divergence meter to know what I was talking about.

A day later, as I was poking around the lab, looking for this mysterious meter with digits, I came across a binder full of code. "Hashida, what's this?" I asked him, since he probably wrote it.

"Oh, that? That was the code for Operation Jormungandr. That was one we did soon after I joined the lab, the one to find some girl Okarin met once. It was pretty complicated, because it wasn't so easy to find people on the internet back then, and we didn't end up finding her any-"

"And what's this?" Suzuha asked, picking up a rack with some glowing red numbers on it. 1.048592β, it read.

"Uh… that, I don't know. I think Okarin made that. You'll have to ask him about it when you see him."

I frowned at it, reaching back into my dreams from a year ago… "It's… it's the divergence meter I've been looking for."

"Huh? Really?"

"I think so. Apparently it doesn't have enough digits to show the worldline Okabe is currently in."

"How are we going to find him, then?" Daru was pouting.

"I have to finish reading my notes. But I already have some ideas…" No! Ideas bad! People could get hurt or killed! Even the future evil dystopian dictatorship Okabe told me about had started with a single text-message!

But… I couldn't know until I tried, right? "Suzu-chan, you're sure there are no evil regimes with time travel in the future?"

She giggled. "As far as I know! I know you'll be careful with tests, don't worry!"

 _You died once already_ , I thought at her. _I'm just going to go ahead and worry, even while I venture into the lion's den once more_. "Hashida… is there a way to adapt the code to find Okabe instead of some girl?"

"Hmmm. I could try. But it's really only designed for the internet." He flipped through the code in the binder. "Hey, I remember now. He was looking for a girl who had red hair and blue eyes. Like you. But she was older than you."

"Did he say when he met her?" I asked, but I had the feeling I already knew the answer.

.

A week later, and we'd managed to use the code anyway, along with the divergence meter and my neurological studies, to turn the time machine into a sort of radio scanner, looking through the 'frequencies' of the worldlines for the one Okabe was in. Suzuha suggested the completely crazy idea of returning to Steins;Gate directly and hoping he would show up, but I was pretty sure he was the key to that endeavour, that the universe would align once he was recovered and there wouldn't be anything I could do about it anyway. I didn't even know what worldline Steins;Gate was.

I was sweating and shaking the first time we tried it, but nothing exploded this time. I'd made sure no one except Suzuha and me was around in the first place, though, although if it went nuclear again there wasn't much that would really help. There was one place where the time machine beeped a positive result, the last digit flickering between a 6 and a 7, though mostly on 6. Then it was on to stage two: confirming and testing.

A day later, and we had completed our preliminary tests involving text messages and bananas without incident. Okabe didn't text back, but the messages went through to the unlisted number, and the bananas vanished without appearing as gel anywhere, although that particular test didn't mean much. The only way we were going to get any more answers was if I tested it myself. I certainly wasn't going to ask Suzuha to test it for me. I would save her this time if it was possible to save her.

"We did it," I said to Mayuri, Suzuha, and Daru. "And this time it works. It won't destroy the world. It won't change the world as we know it. It won't kill the people inside. It won't end up in wierd places in Earth's gravitational field. All it will do is bring him home." And, of course, bring this worldline's Suzuha home after we were done with it. But first it had to get to the worldline outside of time.

Worldline 1.0485961β. The R worldline. The one that shouldn't exist.

"Okarin will be so proud of you," Mayuri said, clapping her hands together.

"And of you, too," I said. "Let's begin Operation Fenris!"

"You remember all the controls I showed you?" Suzuha asked.

"I do," I said. "Mayuri, if I'm not back within a day, if I completely mess up, go use the time-leap device and tell me it didn't work."

"Roger!" Mayuri chirped, saluting cutely.

"If you do make it back but don't find him the first time, it'll take the batteries another week to recharge," Daru warned me, turning the power on and disconnecting the cables, but he had a smile on. "Go get that idiot."

I stepped into the time machine, a determined grin on my face. "Well, as he always said… El. Psy. Kongroo."

"El Psy Kongroo!" Mayuri chirped back as the door closed.

Time travel was impossible. I'd always believed it to be so. To move against the current of time or to skip ahead through it, to take the very fabric of the universe itself and do as you would with it, was beyond the power of mortals to accomplish.

And now I was sitting inside a machine that I believed would not only do that, but escape time itself. It was beyond impossible. But he had gone before me, as he always had.

I set the coordinates and laughed as he always did, to cover my mounting nerves. "Ohohohoho!" I really needed to practice that to equal him.

.

The street was a familiar one to me, one of the main roads through Akiba. It should have been full of hundreds, thousands of people, marching about on their own business; the thrum of humanity should have filled the air, or at least the buzz of the cicadas.

It was silent in this worldline, except for the wind and the soft tap of my footsteps on pavement as I ran, looking for the one living being who should be here. I could feel it in my heart, in my bones that he was here, and my heart beat wildly, urging me onward.

There. I stopped. Just ahead of me, a solitary figure in white, hunched slightly where he sat in the middle of the road, looking at his phone with a painfully wistful smile. He was watching the test video I'd sent through to the space between the worlds. And there was a small pile of banana peels beside him.

"What are you gawking at? Pervert!" I teased him. He jumped and turned, and gave me a truly glad smile which I returned. "There you are. I've been looking for you."

He turned away, putting his phone to his ear without dialing. "It's me. I'm seeing and hearing hallucinations- The choice of Steins;Gate?"

"Okabe." I held out my hand to him. "Come back to Steins;Gate. You don't belong here. You belong with us. You're trying to come back, anyway. You remember how you wandered through worldlines a year ago, looking for the right one? And I was always at your side? And all your friends, Mayuri, Hashida, Urushibara-san, Feyris-san… even Suzu-chan." I shook my head. "You were arrogant to think that you had to hold up the weight of the world by yourself. No matter where you are, you will never be alone. I will always find you, and always ask you to come home."

He looked at my hand for a minute, then lowered his head to make another resigned smile – but without sadness now. He reached out to accept my hand and let me pull him to his feet. "Anywhere with you." Amber eyes stared into mine so tenderly.

"G-good," I said, ruining the moment a little with sudden embarrassment. But he hadn't let go of my hand yet. In fact, he pulled me into his arms, and we just held each other for a moment. "You're real."

"I think so. And so are you."

"My feelings reached you across time," I said poetically. But I couldn't stay poetic for long, not with Okabe around. "And so did my intellect and my actual self."

"But without your feelings, you wouldn't have made it anywhere," he said, grinning. "…Thanks."

"Just come home. That's all we want."

Hand in hand, we walked through the silent sunlit streets back to the lab, to the roof where the time machine was, stationary within Earth's gravitational field. We came onto the roof and he stopped short, gaping in astonishment. "What- how-"

"It works," I said simply. "My future self built it, Suzu-chan brought it to me, and taught me how to use it. It only took a bit of tweaking to find you."

"I… wow. Have I ever told you how amazing you are, Christina?"

I felt a blush coming up. "Not without burying it under a million stupid nicknames."

He laughed. "Nothing went wrong this time?"

"Nothing. I learned. And if all goes well, it will vanish once we get back to Steins;Gate, it will stay in the worldline with Suzu-chan. Steins;Gate has no time travel. Because you won't have disappeared in the first place. No World War III, no dystopian dictatorships." I dropped my voice. "Although Suzu-chan didn't give me the lottery numbers or anything…"

His laughter pealed out loud and clear and my heart warmed almost painfully.

I made him get in first. I didn't want to lose sight of him for a moment. No Orpheus in the underworld here. Even though that wasn't Norse.

He looked around in interest. "It's impressive. Different from the ones I've been in before. How exactly are we getting to the time we ought to be in?"

"Thanks. And I'm just going to set the time to when I left. There's no actual time here, which is why you're not dead of starvation, so just returning to 'normal time' should automatically set us onto Steins;Gate since I'm alive and Mayuri's alive and you're alive." I tried to hide from him how nervous I was, even though I was babbling embarrassingly.. I'd been nervous coming to find him, yes, but now that his precious self was with me… I'd never tried it with someone else before… if something should happen _now_ …

He leaned forward, getting my attention. "Hey. Stop worrying."

I jumped, blushing. "How did you know?"

He sat back again, smirking. "I always know how my assistant is feeling. But truly, there's nothing a strong, intelligent, determined… perverted genius girl can't do."

I squawked at him indignantly, but my hands were flying over the controls, setting them to the same time that I had left, adding five minutes so as not to hit myself. I hit the big red button – he grinned on seeing it – and the worldline hop was set in motion. "We should arrive at 3:17 on August 24th. Hashida's going out tonight with Yuki-chan."

"You know," he said very quietly, not looking at me, "this is the only time you've come to save me."

I stared at him, my heart beating more quickly at the implication. "So- you mean…"

He looked back at me and smiled, giddily. "It's going to work. You've changed things. My brain won't be messed up anymore."

"That was the point!" I said, looking away and blushing. "Oh, I hate this part…" I hunched over, grunting, as the forces of time travel kicked in. I was tense from head to foot. Please, don't let anything bad happen… Don't let him disappear from in front of me, don't let the time machine crash, don't turn us into jelly…

I felt his hands take mine tightly, and looked up to see his encouraging smile, though he was also painfully braced against the forces. I smiled back.

.

Whump! We re-appeared on the roof, with such force that our hands were torn from each other and we landed on our backsides. "Ouch, ouch, ouch!" I cried; across from me, Okabe made a pained groan. There was no sign of the time machine or of Suzuha.

"Tuturu!" Mayuri chirped, as if we hadn't just appeared out of thin air. "You made it back! Together!"

Together… I scrambled to my feet, he was doing the same, and launched myself into his open arms. He held me tightly, and I wrapped my arms around his waist and clung to him. It was over. He was back. And now he knew truly that I would never let him go. That I… loved him.

Mayuri was giggling at us, and Daru was catcalling from his laptop. I glared at him around Okabe's arm. But that only seemed to encourage him. "It's about time, lolz!"

Okabe kept a tight hold of me with one arm, but he freed the other one to point dramatically. "Let it be known that Hououin Kyouma, by the courage of his faithful assistant and the aid of his minions, has returned to Steins;Gate!"

I rolled my eyes. "You nutcase."

Mayuri clapped her hands as she skipped to the stairs. "Mayushii is so happy Okarin is back! Everything is okay now, right?"

"We should have another party to celebrate," Daru said, picking up his laptop to follow her.

"Certainly we should! Let the world tremble at the news!" Kyouma boomed. Then he wilted slightly. "Ah, but I can't really afford it right now… I spent all my money on the party for Christina."

I sighed. "Always the same story. I'll cover it, this time. After all, it's only fair. And there's no 'tina' in my name!"

He cleared his throat. "Right! Then, uh, thanks."

"Let's plan it right now!" Mayuri said.

.

The others didn't want to leave, understandably, but eventually they went home – Mayuri had a train to catch, Daru had that date with Yuki… We'd set the party for tomorrow night with hardly any tsundere waffling at all.

Okabe walked me home to my hotel. "Are you sure you're going to be all right on your own?" I asked him. "I kind of don't want to let you out of my sight, but you must be tired."

"And you must be tireder, with all the work you've been doing," he answered, then added with a smirk. "You're not inviting me up to your room, are you, perverted genius girl?"

I slapped his shoulder. "I was _going_ to, but now you can go home on your own, perverted idiot."

He captured my hand in his. His hands were so large and warm. "I know what you mean, though. Being here… now… with you… It's too good to be true. But that's the will of Steins;Gate, isn't it?"

"It better be, because it's the will of me," I said, and relented. "All right, come up. The bed's big enough for three, so we can maintain propriety. And if you try anything I will smash your face in." But I was smiling, although I was also blushing.

He smiled back. "Nothing you don't want. Promise. Just to make sure no one vanishes."

"Exactly."

He bent his head and kissed me, and my grip tightened on his hand possessively.


End file.
